


River of Opals

by TimeLordOfPie



Category: Fullmetal Alchemist: Brotherhood & Manga
Genre: Explicit Language, Violence
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-08-29
Updated: 2017-04-04
Packaged: 2018-04-17 18:41:55
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 14
Words: 26,631
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4677206
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TimeLordOfPie/pseuds/TimeLordOfPie
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A teenage girl gives up everything, in an attempt to help someone she doesn't even know, leading to a life of confusion and danger inside an anime she had sworn to avoid.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

The table crashed to the floor in a flurry of papers and the wood gave a groan of protest before promptly collapsing in on itself. I glared at the flimsy TV table heaped in the middle of my room and leaned over the mess to yank my iPod out of the wreckage, untangling my headphones from a loose piece of debris. I glanced at the image on the screen and threw the offending object on my bed. The picture stared back mockingly.  
A coffin was halfway down into the grave, surrounded by military personnel. I held in tears with sheer willpower, and turned away from it, grabbing the bag that was hanging from the bedpost, as well as the knee length khaki jacket that was trapped underneath it. Swinging my bedroom door open with more force than was probably necessary I called out to my Aunt Samantha.  
“Sam, I’m headed out for the library.”   
She poked her head in from the kitchen, flour dusted across her lemon yellow apron, and caught in her dark blonde hair. Her green eyes surveyed me warily,  
“What do you need from the library? You are aware we have wifi, right? Besides, I thought you were marathoning that anime your brother recommended for you. You loved it yesterday.”  
I shook my head rapidly.  
“Your use of the past tense is the key here. Love-ED. Formerly. As in, no more. It was amazing, until they killed Hughes. And Roy was crying! Well, he said it was raining, but that was probably to save face or something…In any case I am now DONE with Fullmetal Alchemist Brotherhood! I’m now going to the library to pick up that summer reading for AP English.”  
Sam looked at me blankly for a second before rolling her eyes.  
“Yeah, whatever just make sure that you’re back by 7, Taylor should be back from work early and we can all eat dinner together. Why don’t you just download the eBooks for those? It’s much less work and takes up less space.”  
My house keys clinked as I grabbed them from the bowl on the sofa table by the door,  
“You know very well that virtual books can’t compare, they don’t have the same smell and feel, plus if I’m going to remember this crap for the rest of my life I want the picture to be of traditional ink and paper.”  
Sam’s demeanor changed almost automatically,  
“About that, you’ve got your medicine, don’t you? I would hate for you to have an episode in the middle of the library and be helpless. Maybe I should go with you just in case-“  
I cut her off quickly,  
“It's in my bag, I can handle myself. I’ve been dealing with this for a very long time now.”  
She looked unsure, “Yeah, you have, but no one really knows how an eidetic memory affects those in their teens, everyone else grows out of it between 6 and 12, that medicine isn’t actually foolproof…”  
Rolling my eyes again I waved as I walked to the door, “I know, I know. Believe me, I know the statistics. I’ll be fine, see you at dinner Sam.”  
I caught my reflection in the hall mirror and stopped. Brown eyes stared back, set on a thin face framed with chin length, scraggly, coffee brown hair. It wasn’t frizzy, curly, or straight. It was caught in that no man’s land of extreme waves that made it look like I had just crawled out of the shower and bunched my hair up in a towel for 7 hours straight. My bangs were parted slightly to the left and were about eye length when they weren’t swept off to the side.  
I ran my eyes over my outfit to make sure that it matched. A Red t-shirt that proclaimed ‘Dawn of the Daleks’, dark boot-cut jeans, and ankle high black converse. My khaki jacket was a birthday present from my brother. It was a custom order female version of the tenth doctor’s trench coat, and had a bewildering amount of hidden pockets on the inside. With one last disapproving look at my hair I charged out the door, swinging it shut behind me, and took off at a brisk pace for the library.  
I had acted nonchalant in front of her but Sam’s words brought back old worries. An eidetic memory was as close to perfect as was recorded so far, and even then it had its limits. How clear the mental image was supposedly faded after a few minutes, and the ability to keep the perfect recollections for even that long was supposed to fade around six years old. My brain had baffled doctors when I kept the images clear for indefinite amounts of time. And even more so when it lasted as long as it had. I was 17 and going into my senior year of high school with my memory still the way it had always been.  
Remembering everything took its toll on me. I had trouble sleeping and my appetite faded. I was too thin, and any muscle I had from sports as a child had faded years ago. The only thing that kept my weight acceptable was a slight addiction to soda pop and various other junk foods, though it wasn't ideal in any sort of way. The kind of attention the ability brought was also unwanted. Teenagers didn’t want a friend who would remember their every mistake, and who didn’t even have to try to pass tests. Bullying was common, I tried not to care. There were always those that thought it 'cool', the other side of the metaphorical coin.  
My most pressing issue was losing my mind. I was always told how brilliant it was, and how blessed I was to have what I did, but I didn’t see it. I was constantly plagued with images, my head was getting crowded by the time I was around 14, when statistics and history stated the ability should have faded. I nearly went insane. But my brother Taylor came through for me, even if it was an accident. Apparently a show starring a modern version of Sherlock Holmes had the idea of a mind palace. I heard the theory while my brother and I were watching the show. It all clicked. I couldn’t get rid of the images, but I could move them. If they were organized they’d still be there and I could get to them, but they couldn’t overwhelm me.   
And that theory worked. But I would still have sudden attacks. It would be like a door opened in my mind and I was flooded with images. I was suffocating in them, and I couldn’t tell where I was anymore, or what I was doing. I had collapsed in the mall before, when on my own, and had barely managed to take the anti-anxiety drug I had been prescribed for just that kind of situation. I had finally got my bearings and realized that no one had noticed. I could have been having a seizure and the people in that mall couldn’t have cared less, being more worried about getting their shopping done.  
Remembering the encounter nearly sent me into an attack, though I hadn't had one in quite a while by this point. I yanked myself out of it forcefully, just in time to notice that I had been walking for too long. I looked over my shoulder and saw the street I should have turned at a few blocks behind me.  
I started to turn when I heard it, a low moan from the alleyway to my right. I took a few tentative steps forward and looked in cautiously. I noticed a large amount of blood pooled around a man wearing blue, the contrasting colors jumping out at me. I automatically took a step forward to see if I could help, but was stopped. I reached a finger up to the air in front of me and tapped the exact area I had just tried to push through. My finger rebounded off a barrier, sending beige ripples through the air. The man groaned again, causing me to shift my attention back to him. I had noticed earlier that the blue he wore was from the military uniform I had seen in the anime I'd only just abandoned.  
I had assumed it was a mugged cosplayer but after seeing this ‘magic barrier’ I wasn’t so sure. The man finally realized there was someone nearby and turned his head to face me. I had never seen this man before in my life, but he looked at me like I was an angel sent from god, his eyes filled with hope. He took a deep breath and managed to rattle out, “Help…me…”  
He collapsed back down to the ground. I didn’t know who he was, or what was going on, but I did know that I didn’t want to be like those people from the mall, who walked by tragedy too concerned with themselves to help another human being in danger. I made my bony left hand into a fist, mindful of my class ring on the other hand; I didn’t really feel like having to help that man while nursing my own broken knuckle. I thought back to my brothers’ pointers on self-defense before I sent a punch flying at the barrier, orienting my wrist as I had seen my brother demonstrate to me all those months ago.  
More ripples spread across the alley, these were more fierce, and I felt I was getting somewhere. I sent hit after hit, even throwing in a few kicks. Eventually, the ripples were everywhere, it looked as if the entire barrier were vibrating, then it stopped. There was no dissipation like with the previous ripples. These stopped in the middle of where they were going. Everything was completely and utterly still. Then the barrier went from clear, to pure white.  
A figure of white outlined in fuzzy black formed in the space. It cocked its head at me and grinned. I had to hold back a gasp. I was right. That man had to be a real Amestrian, because this could only be the Truth, unless I'd tripped on my walk to the library and landed in a puddle of LSD. I gulped as it surveyed me, briefly questioning my sanity for what certainly wasn’t the first time in my life.  
“So, you dare to knock on the door? And very obnoxiously too.”  
Shocked and a little bit terrified I shook my head.  
“I didn’t mean it that way, I just want to get to that man, he’s in trouble, and someone needs to help him.”  
I waited with bated breath as it seemed to think of a response. I thought it wasn’t going to reply when suddenly,  
“And you think that you are the person he needs?”  
“Well, I am the only one here. “  
If a god-like creature could roll its eyes, I bet that one did.  
He stepped back away from the center of the barrier,  
“You are only here by luck. The dimensions are weak here, leaving a hole; I’m just guarding it until it gets fixed. You say you want to pass through in order to help, what do you have to offer?”  
I desperately searched my memory, positive what I was looking for was located in the 2nd-floor coat closet in my mind palace. I was right. I pulled out my cheap cell phone.  
“A philosopher’s stone would gain passage, right?”  
“Yeeees, but you obviously don’t have one.”  
“No, I don’t, but all the stone is, is energy. Human lives condensed into a sort of portable battery for alchemists to use to fuel their transmutations. Well, here’s a battery, portable energy. That works, right? Different sciences, but different dimensions. Poe-tay-toe, Poe-tah-toe and all that.”  
It laughed, its multitude of voices grating on my nerves, nearly sending me running for the hills, and making me doubt my conclusion. It paused for a second, the longest second in my life.  
“Correct. You may pass, human.”  
My cell phone was grabbed by black hands and was pulled into the barrier. The barrier faded once it was touched by the cell phone. I took a step forward but paused when I heard the Truth speak again.  
“But remember, there is no going back.”  
Those words made my blood run cold. He continued, “This rift is closing for good the moment you step through. Are you sure you’re willing to give up everything for this one human you don’t even know?”  
I gulped, doubts surging through my mind. But I straightened my back and stepped through anyway. I would never forgive myself if I acted like those people; the ones who ignored me, who would have let me die. I wouldn’t let a man die in front of me when I could change it. Besides. This rift...oddly specific wording, nevermind the possibilities implicated in a rift between dimensions. What human being had the capability to leave that alone? A boring one with more self-preservation than curiousity, probably.   
I felt the barrier slip closed behind me, and struggled not to look back. I had made my choice, no going back.   
The change of scenery disoriented me, the colors morphed drastically, and I nearly sighed in frustration. I guess I’m an anime character then. Joy. My skin was itching and I desperately wished for a mirror, and maybe a hospital. What sort of havoc would that odd sort of change have on my biology, dimension traveling and perspective change and all of that? It was enough to start a headache pounding somewhere in the attic.   
I brought forward the memory of the health class we went over first aid in, using the pocket knife from one of my numerous pockets to rip my red over shirt, exposing my black tank top. It was several minutes before the bandages were in place and I had deemed it was safe to move the man. He had stuttered out that his name was Kyle earlier on, and I had asked random questions through the entire process in an attempt to keep him both awake and calm. I had learned that his fiancé was at home with their 2 dogs and one cat, which in his opinion was possessed by some sort of demon.  
With Kyle leaning on me we stumbled towards the street, attempting to get out of the alleyway. Probably looking like quite the pair, burly military man leaning on a tiny teenage girl.  
“Hey Kyle, not to pry or anything, but how did this happen?”  
“I was helping in the pursuit of the Freezer Alchemist when I was shot by one of his rouge water bullets. I barely managed to pull myself out of the way of the fight before I collapsed. Thanks for the help, Miss.”  
My heart skipped a beat. The Freezer Alchemist was the focus of the very first episode of Brotherhood. I was at the beginning of the series, if it followed the storyline at all. But if it did, I knew what would happen. For a while at least, I had given up after the burial of Hughes left me emotionally scarred.  
As I stumbled down the street with an injured soldier weighing me down near to the point of collapse it finally hit me. I was in the world of the Brotherhood. An anime, and not even the version of it I was familiar with. All I knew of this one was what happened before Hughes death, and that the plotline was completely different from the one that I'd actually seen. Trying to tear myself away from worries over 'plot' and if it was even accurate I nearly laughed at the irony. Not even an hour after I swore to never watch the show again I ended up living in it.


	2. Chapter 2

It was dark in Central by the time we reached a crowd of people. The both of us were covered in sweat and my jeans were soaked in blood from kneeling in the puddles surrounding Kyle while I was bandaging him up as best as possible, which had me mentally cringing and worrying about anime bloodborne diseases. I was extremely lucky that he was a rather short man, because I was a bit on the short side and indisputably underweight, with no muscle mass whatsoever. To be honest we were mostly operating on his power and using me as a living crutch.  
The both of us were dangerously close to collapse when we finally reached the crowd of people. My vision was blurring and I was seeing dark spots, flashes of purple and black. It could be because of that headache upon arrival, the strain of helping Kyle walk, or hell, this dimension could be rejecting me for all I knew. I heard one of Kyle’s friends call out to us, but I couldn’t comprehend the words through the pounding in my head. Someone I assumed was a medic took him off my hands, and I lost track of him. I doubted I would see him again anytime soon.   
I was hunched over, with my hands on my knees attempting to catch my breath when I finally realized that someone was talking to me. I glanced up, through a curtain of hair and barely managed to keep calm. Looking at me with concern was one Lt. Colonel Maes Hughes. I took one last deep breath and asked,  
“I’m sorry, what was that again?”  
He laughed a little and gave me a small smile,  
“I was asking what your name was, Miss.”  
I nodded, still trying to breathe, “Ah; makes sense I suppose. My name’s Stephanie Arcaro. And you are?”  
Hughes grinned, “I’m Lieutenant Colonel Maes Hughes. That was quite something you did for Private Moriston back there.”  
I looked at him funny for a second before realization hit, Kyle’s last name hadn’t come up in our ridiculous Q&A session. I shrugged,  
“Meh, couldn’t leave him there.”  
Hughes shook his head, “That’s the thing, you could’ve. You aren’t military, it wasn’t any of your business, but you stopped to help. That takes kindness.”  
I squirmed under his gaze, uncomfortable with the assessment, and suddenly worrying for what kind of dimension I was in if this was what he thought. “Well, not really, it didn’t really occur to me that I could just keep walking. It was kind of a given, guys hurt ya help him…”  
There was a pause before he stuck his hand out to shake, smiling slightly, “It’s a pleasure to meet someone like you Miss Arcaro.”  
I stared at his hand for a second before showing mine, covered in blood, and laughing slightly, “Heh, it’s a pleasure to meet you too, but I wouldn’t recommend human contact at the moment. You know all that ‘first rule of first aid’ crud. Treat all blood as if contaminated.”  
He nodded in agreement, “Right. We should get you cleaned up.”  
I shook my head vigorously, “No, no I’m fine, I’ll just be on my way actually, since Private Moriston is now in more capable hands.”  
I turned to leave when he caught my shoulder, I looked at him and he asked, “Do you even have anywhere to stay? You don’t exactly seem like you’re from around here.”  
It hit me then, when he asked. I was alone. There was no going back. I wasn’t going to see Taylor again, or taste whatever concoction Sam had invented for the night. I wasn’t going to finish high school or go to college. I was stuck in a world I had very little practical information about. I had no paperwork, birth certificate or anyone who would vouch for my identity. I was technically an illegal immigrant and I had just waltzed up to the military.  
With herculean willpower I resisted the impulse to face palm. “No I don’t have anywhere to stay.”  
He grinned suddenly, “Then you can stay with me and my wife for a while! You can see our daughter Elicia! I have a picture here, isn’t she just adorable! In this one she has on her mommy’s hat, isn’t that just so cute!”  
I stared dumbly at the man. When I had seen these outbursts on the screen I had laughed at the expressions of those on the receiving end and had doubted that any real person would ever just invite people they didn’t know to be around their families, especially a family man of Hughes caliber. But here I was, experiencing it.  
I backed up suddenly, “No, no that’s fine, I’m sure that I can find a place to stay or something, there’s no need for me to inconvenience you or anything.”  
“Nonsense!” Hughes grabbed my shoulders, and wheeled me around, pushing me through the crowd. “It’s the least we can do for helping our man like that! Please, I insist.”  
I glanced around at everyone, half hoping that someone would rescue me, and the other part of me was hoping that I could actually get a place to stay for the night this easily, though I suspected this might serve as a way to keep an eye on me. It was the middle of the night and I had no money that would be acceptable currency in this country, nor could it be exchanged. It was worthless paper now, cotton fiber paper, but still.   
Hughes continued to talk as he forced me forward. “I have some other guests staying at the moment, but I’m sure we can hash out who sleeps where whenever we get there. I’m sure that the three of you will get along well.”  
While I was aware that the Elric brothers were staying with Hughes it hadn’t quite hit me that I was now too. Meaning I got to meet them. The inner fangirl in me nearly went into cardiac arrest. I managed to pull myself together enough to put on the act that I DIDN’T know absolutely everything that would happen to everyone for the next while.  
“Who are they?”  
“Who are who?” Hughes snapped out of his monologue in confusion.  
“These ‘guests’ that you already have staying the night? You mentioned there were guests but didn’t tell me their names or anything.”  
“Oh, it’s the Fullmetal Alchemist and his younger brother Alphonse. They're around your age, maybe 14 and 15, they’re really nice kids once you get to know them. How old are you anyway? I don’t know anything about you and I’m taking you home with me.”  
I was finally saved by a deep voice resonating from behind us.  
“Taking strays home again, Hughes? I thought you already had a few tucked away for now.”  
We both stopped and turned to face the person who spoke. I found myself face to face (rather face to chest, he’s pretty damn tall) with Colonel Roy Mustang. A computer screen cannot do this man justice. If my inner fangirl nearly had a heart attack at the thought of Fullmetal then she let out a banshee scream and died at the voice and appearance of the Colonel. I gave her a swift mental kick to get her moving again before tuning back into the conversation.  
Hughes was just laughing at his friends’ statement, “Oh, Roy, of course I still have them somewhere, do you think I would have let them stay anywhere else while they were still in town? And anyway this isn’t just some random stray! This is the girl who rescued Private Moriston! I found out she has nowhere to stay so I was just doing the gentlemanly thing and offering her a bed for the night!”  
He rolled his eyes, “Offering? From the looks of things you were abducting her-wait, did you say she rescue Moriston? What happened to him?”  
All eyes were on me then. I froze for a second then summoned up every pathetic ounce of courage I had. “From what he told me he was a part of a group attempting to apprehend the Freezer Alchemist, and was hit by a stray ‘ice bullet’ of some sort, alchemy nonsense I can’t comprehend, and got separated from his group. He stumbled around until he ended up in an alleyway. I was wandering around searching for a place to stay when I saw him. I stopped and patched him up and helped him to get here where they could care for him properly.”  
Through some of it I lied through my teeth, and didn’t even bother trying to explain the whole ‘alternate dimension you're from a TV show’ thing because that wouldn’t fly. When I was done with my mini monologue Mustang raised one eyebrow. “Well then, that was noble of you.”  
It was obvious he could tell that I was barely suppressing the urge to roll my eyes. “It’s what most anyone would have done in my place.”  
While I knew this wasn’t true I replaced ‘would’ with ‘should’ within the boundaries of my mind, so that as I said it, it would ring true-ish at least. He could tell I wasn’t quite convinced and decided to press the issue. “No, really, not many people would bother to help a member of the military if there wasn’t something in it for them.”  
This time I did roll my eyes. I couldn’t help it, I might have been strangely mature even back when I was 14 years of age, but I was almost positive that teenage attitude was not leaving my personality for years to come, it ever. I avoided eye contact as I responded, “Military or not, he’s a human being.”  
I looked over my shoulder to where the body of the rogue state alchemist was being processed. I dimly heard Mustang reply, “True.”  
Hughes began to drag me away once more, “I’ll take her over to your temporary office in the morning so that she can add her statement to your mound of paperwork! For now we’re both exhausted I’m sure, so I’ll give you MY paperwork then too.”  
I heard a noise of disgust from somewhere behind me in response to Hughes cheerful statement. Apparently paperwork was not a good thing, who knew?  
We wound our way through the streets of central, walking in silence for a while and I was finally relaxing, thinking that he had forgotten to ask his many questions about my identity. I wasn’t confident in my ability to lie on the spot about where I was from, and why I was in Central. My hopes for getting away with not answering them earlier were shattered when he spoke up suddenly.  
“So, Stephanie was it? How old did you say you were?”  
I was tempted to answer that I hadn’t said how old I was and then leaving it at that but Hughes was such a nice guy and he was giving me a place to stay… I’m almost positive he had already assumed I wasn’t going to answer because when I did he jumped.  
“17.”  
“Eh, what was that?”  
“I said that I am 17 years old. In a few months I’ll be 18.”  
“Really? But you’re so tiny!” I’m not sure if he expected me to blow up like Edward usually did, but I replied with a slight affirmative head bob. He continued on, “I mean, like super tiny! I can see your bones in many places, have you been eating properly?”  
It registered that he was trying to imply that I was the standard runaway, with no place to live and who hadn’t been eating for a while. In a way I had run away from home, but I was in poor health for quite a while now. Well, no point in lying about it.  
“I was ill recently and haven’t quite recovered.”  
“Oh? It must’ve been some illness to have affected you like this.”  
“Severe emotional trauma compounded with various other unfavorable factors.”  
“That’s quite a vocabulary you’ve got there.”  
“I read.”  
The conversation faded out, and I couldn’t tell if Hughes was itching to ask about my past, or not. He seemed perfectly content to walk along in complete silence. I, however, was uncomfortable with allowing him time to stew about more questions to ask.  
“So, you mentioned a daughter, Elicia, right?”  
That immediately sent him into a monologue, complete with pictures about how cute and perfect his little girl was. He happily chatted away about her various adorable escapades, and I filed my mental copy of the photos into its own special album, putting it in the 3rd floor library, labeling it ‘Elicia Hughes’. I made sure to make the cover pink (her favorite color apparently); even though I knew she would never see it. Details such as that organized my mind and kept order, they kept me sane.  
I made comments occasionally, complimenting certain outfits or hairstyles that I saw, and Hughes was enjoying having an interactive audience for once. When we finally reached his house he hopped up the steps in excitement and flung the door open, “Honey, I’m back! And I brought another guest!”  
As I stepped into the house, dread filling me at finally meeting the infamous Edward Elric, I took a deep breath. Then I stepped inside, and was immediately met with the sight of the familiar alchemist. Gold eyes surveyed me critically, and I waited with bated breath for his first words to me.  
When he finally opened his mouth, what came out was, “Who the hell are you?”


	3. Chapter 3

“Well? Who the hell are ya, don’t just stand there, say something!”  
While the Fullmetal Alchemist berated me for my silence I experience my first ever anime sweat-drop. I hadn’t expected there to actually be a feeling to it, but it was like a warm sponge sliding down the right side of my face, slowly, and then disappearing. Shaking off the strange new feeling and trying not to freak out a little I opened my mouth to answer him when Hughes cut in.  
“This is Stephanie; she’s going to be staying here until she finds a more permanent residence. There’s a washroom up that hall and second room on the right. After dinner I’ll look to see if we have anything for you to wear for the night, because I’m assuming you don’t have anything of the sort in that bag.”  
My ears pricked up, I had thought this was one night deal, for until the military had my report about tonight and then was done with me. I should’ve known better, Hughes was too kind a man for that, unless he was thinking with his military hindbrain and just wanted to keep an eye on an unknown variable. I nodded to his question, and with a quick word of thanks I made my way to the bathroom he pointed out, using my elbow to carefully push the door open, trying to avoid getting blood everywhere. I once again used my elbow, this time to nudge on the water, and I set about the tedious task of trying to make sure I didn’t look like a serial killer anymore for when I would meet with other important characters. My first impression I made on Edward Elric was shot, nothing to do about it. I had shown up on the doorstep in the middle of the night, covered in blood, and most likely looking like utter shit.  
After my hands were considerably cleaner thanks to a strange yet refreshing smelling purple soap I found by the sink, I inspected my clothes. My t-shirt was probably a loss, which saddened me a bit, but I would probably end up keeping it anyway as a memoir of my past life. At the sight of the Dalek on the front of my shirt all the blood fled my face. Doctor Who. I was going to miss the first full episode featuring Capaldi’s Doctor. I wouldn’t ever find out what happens to Clara, or Gallifrey. Nor would I ever see what new interior the TARDIS picked. I barely resisted slamming my forehead into the mirror in front of me, feeling an anime gloom settle on my shoulders, dark and thick.  
By the time I had finished washing the blood spots from the stain/water (and apparently blood) resistant sleeves of my coat the gloom had faded, dreary acceptance penetrating the air instead. I checked my hair in the mirror one last time, running my fingers through the scraggly mess I sighed, wishing I’d thought to shove an elastic ponytail holder into my bag before I left the house.  
I walked back to the front room, noticing the absence of Hughes, and how Edward watched me suspiciously from his place leaned against the wall in the corner of the room. I hung my coat on a free hook by the door, pondering what I would have done if the coat had been ruined by all of the blood. Curl up and die was the most likely answer I could come up with, though dramatics aside I would probably dye the entire thing a solid color to hide the stain and allow me to keep it.  
My attention was once again snapped back to the real world when I heard clanking and another familiar voice filled the room, “Brother, what’s wrong? Oh, hello there miss.”  
I turned, filled with excitement at meeting sweet little Alphonse Elric, and then remembered he wasn’t so little at this point in time. I looked straight up at the hulking suit of armor, and wondered how no one noticed that his eyes glowed red, and were obviously not originating from a solid human being within the suit. From the corner of my eye I noticed Edward looking at me wearily, as if waiting for me to faint at the sight of his little brother. I resisted an eye roll at the state alchemist and stuck out my hand for Alphonse to shake. As if anyone could be afraid of someone so sweet.  
“Hello, it’s nice to meet you, I’m Stephanie Arcaro.”  
He tentatively took my hand as if terrified that he might somehow break me, which was actually completely possible given that he had superhuman strength and I was pretty freakin’ frail.   
“I’m Alphonse Elric, and the rude one over there is my big brother Edward. I’ve never heard a name like Arcaro before, is it from another country?”  
My eyes darted up to his face, well, helmet, in surprise. He caught on to that way quick, even for the super genius he was said to be. Maybe I should have come up with a false name or something. I tossed that idea out; no way would I have been able to think of an Amestrian name that didn’t already belong to someone.  
“Yeah, it is from another country.”  
I watched him warily for any sign of suspicion towards me but he immediately brightened up, interested in our conversation at a whole new level. I should have known there wouldn’t be suspicion that easily from this kid. He was a kind soul. The pun nearly made me choke on my own spit as I thought this, and I fought to keep a straight face in front of him, I wasn’t supposed to know he was only a soul bonded to armor, but even if he didn’t know what I was thinking, laughing hysterically for no reason would probably freak the poor kid out.  
Alphonse radiated excitement, “So, since your name is from a different country, does that mean that you are too?”  
Edward butt in at this point, “Stop Al, she probably doesn’t want to play 20 questions.”  
After filing away the fact that they had '20 questions' here, I spoke up, honestly just not liking how Alphonse sagged at the scolding. “I really don’t mind, it gives me something to do, and a way for us to get to know one another.” Edward rolled his eyes and flopped down on the couch, studiously ignoring the two of us. I turned back to Al with an eye roll of my own,   
“To answer your question, Alphonse, Yes, I am from a different country.”  
He squirmed, and said distractedly, “Just Al is fine.” And was about to launch into yet another question when a woman I recognized as Gracia Hughes popped her head in from what I assumed to be the kitchen, “I’ve heated up some dinner for you guys, if you’d like to eat now.”  
Edward jumped up, and bolted to the kitchen, leaving me and Alphonse laughing in his wake. I turned to the younger brother, “How do you put up with him?”  
Al shrugged, “Practice, maybe?”  
I snorted, and shook my head, making my own way to the kitchen. When I stepped inside I saw a buffet line sort of thing had been set up along the counter with bowls filled with different foods, and Edward loading up on most of it. I suppressed another eye roll, and was about to head back to the living room, appetite lost at the sight of Edward stuffing turkey down his gullet, when I bumped into someone.  
“Oh, sorry, didn’t see you there.” I apologized to the Lt. Colonel, trying to step around him to get out of the room. He stopped me short, grabbing me by the shoulders and steering me towards to the food, “Oh, no Stephanie, we aren’t having this. You already mentioned you were trying to get over that illness; I’m not having you risk your health in my house. Get some food, you need it, you’re nothing but skin and bones!”  
I rolled my eyes, but smiled slightly anyway, it was a bit difficult to be mad at someone trying so hard just to help me out. I grabbed a plate and piled a bit of food on. Grabbing the glass of water he handed me I headed to the room I had seen Edward enter to find that he and Gracia were already seated. Gracia wasn’t eating, only nursing a cup of coffee and I guessed that she was making small talk. Both Hughes and I entered and found a place to sit, him digging in the moment his bottom hit the chair. He paused only to introduce me to his ‘darling wife’ and to apologize that Elicia ‘her most infamous cuteness’ was already in bed for the night.  
I smiled slightly at Gracia, “It’s nice to meet you Mrs. Hughes; I’m Stephanie Arcaro.” I turned behind me to see Alphonse enter the room, sitting in the seat beside me, obviously lacking food. I heard the first few syllables of a quiet question begin from him but he was unintentionally cut off.  
“Call me Gracia, dear. Is it true what Maes said? That you’re getting over some illness?”  
She sounded worried, her inner mother shining through. I nodded, “Yeah, I was ill recently. I lost more than 50 pounds, and I was by no means heavy beforehand. But I’m better now; I just have to be smart, and not push myself too much.”  
Oversharing, much? I mentally berated myself, but faced with her genuine concern my tongue ran without the order running to it.   
She didn’t look very reassured, but before she could ask any more questions Edward piped in, “What did you have that would have caused that?” He seemed a bit interested in the conversation, actually pausing between bites to squeeze the question out.  
I could see everyone was waiting for an answer, but I couldn’t tell them what was actually wrong; saying ‘Weeeell, I went crazy and my brain basically started eating itself’ did NOT qualify as a good answer. I glanced down at my food so they wouldn’t see the strange eye movement that happened while I was in my Mind Retreat, my version of a Mind Palace.   
While I’m in the Mind Retreat whatever I visualize myself doing, my eyes will follow as they would if I was actually doing it, so if in my Mind retreat I was reading, my eyes would scroll left to right, as if down a page, even if there was nothing in front of me. It freaked my brother out when it happened the first time. Since then I had learned to hide my eyes when I wanted to inconspicuously look things up, like now.  
I retreated to my Mind, mental me taking off running from the last room I had been in and tumbling down the stairs to the first floor library. Unlike the 3rd floor library, which was full of pictures and memorabilia, this library was filled with solid information, such as medical conditions that would lead to sudden and extreme weight loss. It was modeled a bit after the Tenth Doctors control room, which thrilled me every time I went there. I went straight for what I was looking for, going directly to the pronunciation-friendly part of the passage, and brought the info to the front of my mind where I could relay it back to the people waiting in the real world.  
When I zoned back into what was actually happening around me, only a few seconds had passed. I breathed in preparing to speak when Alphonse cut me off, “No, Ed, that’s not right! You shouldn’t demand answers from her like that! If she feels like telling us, she’ll tell us! Something so serious must have been traumatic for her; she probably doesn’t want to be reminded of it!” Everyone in the room guiltily looked away, reluctantly agreeing with him.  
I inwardly smiled, setting the medical book on the end table by the door to the library for easier access next time this situation happened. The way everyone behaved as if this were an anime, I was starting to realize that it was the culture here in this alternate dimension, rather than being sucked into an actual 'anime' which was just illustration layered with sound. In hindsight, it was kind of obvious. I emerged back into the world confident that I could handle everything. Then Alphonse asked another question, attempting to politely steer the conversation in a different direction.  
“So, what country are you from then?”  
I froze.   
Shit.   
There was no possible way to lie my way out of this one. I knew no countries in this dimension besides Amestris and I had already admitted I wasn’t from there. I was so very screwed.


	4. Chapter 04

“So, what country are you from then?”  
I froze. Shit. There was no possible way to lie my way out of this one. I knew no countries in this dimension besides Amestris and I had already admitted I wasn’t from there. I was so very screwed.

I immediately retreated to my mind, aware that I could spend more time thinking in here than would actually pass out there.   
THIIINK, bitch, what’s wrong with you, eh, some genius you are, can’t even come up with a decent- wait. Never mind, duh.  
“Oh, it’s a small island; I doubt you’ve heard of it, very few people have. We don’t really have much to offer, and we don’t usually leave or associate with outsiders.”  
Hello, Hetalia poster in the middle of my mind retreat library. Thank you Japan, isolationist policy works perfectly for me.   
“But you left it didn’t you? Why?”  
And damn you, observant blonde bastard.  
I glanced at Edward, my mind spinning through possibilities, the moment I see him his info starts running through my head, everything that I know about him, and it clicks that he left partly to escape a small town, or so my brother said when he explained the show to me the first time. I can use that.  
“I just said it was tiny with not much to offer. The real question is why I didn’t leave SOONER.”  
After that conversation flowed for a while, no longer centered on me, and I was finally allowed to eat. Not that I ended up eating much of it anyway, I don’t have much of an appetite. As I sipped my water I felt a small headache forming on the bridge of my nose and identified the cause immediately from experience. I needed caffeine. However, soda was one of the sacrifices that I made coming to this place.That probably wasn't going to end well.  
Alphonse was telling me about a ginger kitten he had found a few days ago when Hughes interjected, “Well, Stephanie, we had better hit the sack. Both of us need to be at the office pretty early. We need to get all our work involving Roy done before he heads back to Eastern at noon.”  
I nodded and stood, grabbing my dishes and heading to the kitchen. As I was about to wash up, purely out of habit Gracia swooped in from nowhere, “I’ll take these, you just head to bed now, Maes will show you where you can sleep for the night.” She smiled kindly at me and I didn’t have the heart, or the energy, to argue with her. I simply nodded, and thanked her before retreating to the living room where everyone had gathered to say their final goodnights.  
Alphonse turned to me, “It was nice meeting you Stephanie, and I hope that we meet again sometime.”  
I raised an eyebrow, “Are you leaving?”  
Edward leapt into the conversation, “Yeah, we set out for Liore in the morning, we’ll have to leave here early to catch the train on time. This is the last we’ll see of you for a while.”  
I shook both of their hands, smiling at them both, “In that case, it was a pleasure meeting you both, and I hope that we can meet again sometime.”  
After the Elrics retreated to their shared guest bedroom Hughes showed me to a room in a corner of the house, he spoke quietly, “This is Elicia’s room; Gracia has already laid out a place for you to sleep. I hope this is alright for you?”  
When I nodded he continued, “This door through here is the bathroom, there are towels under the sink. I’ll try to wake you early enough that you’ll have time to shower.”  
After thanking him once again I slipped silently into the girls’ room, and found the small bed of blankets on the floor. It struck me as slightly odd that they would trust me alone in the same room as their sleeping daughter so soon after meeting me, but then again, anime culture logic wasn't something I was well versed in yet. It did point more towards him being hospitable than him being suspicious of my presence and wanting to keep an eye on me. I didn’t bother taking off my shoes or wrapping up in the blanket, the moment I touched the make-shift bed darkness surrounded me. 

I was shaken awake before dawn and handed a small bundle of clothing. From the moment I opened my eyes I was off balance. The colors were wrong, the shapes were wrong, even the sounds were off in some way. I stumbled unsteadily into the bathroom I had been shown the night before and showered quickly, trying to shake off the disorientation. I towel dried my hair, leaving it only slightly damp, falling in a scraggly mess around my face. I used the mini hairbrush that I always kept in my bag to attempt to tame the mess, and the spare toothbrush they'd set out for me, then examined the clothes that I had been provided. I had completely ignored the black skirt that was provided for me, instead keeping my jeans, that had been scrubbed the night before and dried mostly clean. It wasn't in some protest against gender roles and the assumption of skirt wearing, it was just entirely too long to be a plausible wardrobe option. I again kept on my black camisole and replaced my Dawn of the Daleks shirt with the plain black shirt that I had been provided.  
I pulled on my converse and headed towards the kitchen where I could smell something distinctly bacon-like beckoning me closer. I stuck my head in to see Gracia at the stove, wearing a ruffled pink apron. When she saw me in the doorway she smiled and handed me a plate containing eggs and bacon. I joined Hughes in the dining room, and we ate in comfortable silence.  
As we dropped our dishes off in the kitchen we said goodbye to Gracia, with me thanking her for her hospitality. We both pulled on our respective trench coats and headed out into the city. We walked mostly in silence for a few minutes until it was broken by Hughes,  
“So, what are your plans for the future?”  
Startled by the sudden question I responded with an oh-so-intelligent “What?”  
“Your plans for the future, what are you planning to do for a living. You must have thought of something when you set out for this place.”  
I shrugged, “I wasn’t actually aiming specifically for here; I’ve just been traveling and just happened to end up here. It seemed like as good a place as any. As for what I’m going to do now, I have no idea. I would love to study Alchemy, but I doubt I’ll have the opportunity for that. The best I can hope for is to find a job in some shop, a bookstore maybe.”  
I could feel his eyes on me as he weighed what he would say next.  
“Have you ever considered the military?”  
I glanced at him, startled, “No, I haven’t seriously considered it. I figured since I was a foreigner I wouldn’t be welcome in the military and I wouldn’t be allowed to or something.”  
“Actually, it’s one of the recommended options for you as an immigrant. There are several ways to earn citizenship, paying heavy taxes being one of the most popular. But there is always the option to serve 5 years in the military.”  
I considered it. Would I really be able to stand working for these people? Hughes or Mustang I wouldn’t mind one bit, because I knew for a fact that they were good people with only the best of intentions, but if I did join the military then there would be every possibility I would end up working for an idiot of some sort, and a mean idiot at that. And even without the question of morals there was the possibility that I couldn’t take military life. Certain physical standards were required for members of such an elite force, and I was certainly not up to those standards at the moment.  
Then there was the little problem of so few women being involved in the Amestrian military, and those that I had seen on the show were decked out in skirts and heels, something that I would never consent to wear unless there was a life or death situation. I'd trip over either of them and fall to my death. As a female I could probably get away with just having a desk job, and leaving all difficult work to the men. But my pride would never allow me to sit behind a desk wearing a skirt and manning the phones while there was excitement happening outside. Plus, that was hardly going to help me keep Hughes alive. After that was the concern that I was a foreigner, recommended option or not there was no way I would have any sort of security clearance of note for several years to come, if ever.   
Hughes was waiting for me to give an answer, but I wasn’t sure of anything.  
“Can I flip a coin or something?”  
He laughed, “I suppose you could, but I wouldn’t recommend leaving such an important decision up to chance.”  
“Hmmm, what would I be expected to do if I did join your military?”  
“Well, it would depend on what branch you joined. There’s the investigative branch, which I’m in, which is almost like a detective agency specialized specifically for the military. Then there are the medics, the state alchemists, and the plain soldiers who handle mostly just physical work. Obviously, there is more than that, but those are really the only ones you need to worry with at the moment.”  
I was guessing it was possible to be in several branches at the same time, what with Armstrong and Mustang being regular soldiers as well as state alchemists, but I knew that wasn’t an option for me at the moment.  
I opened my mouth to ask another question when Hughes stopped me.  
“I know you have a lot of questions about it, but I don’t have all the answers. When we get into the office I’ll grab the information for you to look over before your official statement is taken.”  
I nodded, still absorbed in my thoughts. How would I fit into the military? Honestly, what could I offer, besides a good memory? Eventually, they would have Scheska for that, so I wasn’t even unique in that area. True my memory was undoubtedly better, seeing as hers was only photographic, meaning only image, and I could remember sound, smell, and taste as well, but that wasn’t really something that would make me useful.  
I walked into a large shadow and felt a chill run down my back. I looked up and was met with the sight of a huge complex, consisting of large, impressive buildings. Central Military Command. I had arrived.


	5. Chapter 5

Tall monochrome buildings loomed over us as we entered the complex. Hughes stalked in like he owned the place, waving and grinning like a maniac at everyone in sight, while I tried to blend into his shadow. It was working better than I had originally hoped on account of the fact he had a pretty damn large shadow, being a tall man.  
We were at the front desk in one of the buildings when he grabbed me by the shoulders and pushed me in front of him, presenting me to the woman at the desk. She had thick brown hair, bushy in a way that instantly brought up a mental image of Hermione Granger in her first year at Hogwarts, that disaster of a mane from the first movie. Her face, however, was smooth and unblemished with a delicate smile at the sight of the rambunctious Lt. Colonel. Her eyes were dark green that made me classify her complete look as demented woodland fairy. If demented woodland fairies wore blue military uniforms.  
“Gooood morning June! I need a visitors badge for one Stephanie Arcaro.”  
‘June’ leaned over the desk to get a good look at me, (curse my shortness) and smiled, although it held a slight tint of exasperation. “Did you pick another up off the streets, Hughes? You know kids aren’t like kittens, you can’t just keep them.”  
‘How many times has he done this? Picked a random teenager off the street and brought them to work with him?’  
June lowered her voice dramatically, “If you’re here against your will blink twice.”  
I blinked once out of shock, then laughed at her antics, “It's fine, I’m just here for something that happened yesterday, I’m not quite a stray.”  
She looked at Hughes who was grinning innocently and gave an unconvinced, “Hmmm.”  
Then her attention snapped back to me as she filled out the visitors pass, asking me to spell my name for her. After she was finished she handed me a cheap, plain black lanyard with my information attached to the end. Hughes was about to continue marching into the building when she snapped an arm out to grab the back collar of his coat. His limbs flailed with an anime drama quality as he halfheartedly attempted escape.  
“You know the drill, Lt. Colonel. All visitors must have their bags checked before they can proceed into any part of the building, no matter who they’re with.”  
She dropped him in a heap to the side of her desk and turned an endearing smile my way, holding her hand out for my bag, “I’ll be careful, I promise, Miss Arcaro.”  
I nervously tugged the bag off my shoulder, sifting through my memory to remember what was in the bag. “Just Stephanie is fine.”  
I gently handed over the bag, and she set it down in the cleared area, reaching in to grab whatever was on top. I was fairly certain nothing damning was inside, seeing as I kept most of that in my hidden inside coat pockets. One of the worst that I didn’t want them to find was my favorite pen. While that seems like a kooky thing to ‘normal people’ out there, you have to understand that I am a fangirl. My ‘pen’ was a full size tenth doctor sonic screwdriver, with actual working light on the end. It was a black light, used to reveal the ‘invisible ink’ from a different pen attachment that I kept in yet another pocket.  
Even if you ignored the blatant ‘future-ish’ tech the whole ‘invisible ink’ thing didn’t exactly scream trustworthy.   
The first thing she pulled out was my ‘Dawn of the Dalek’ shirt, still ripped and with dried bloodstains. She looked at me and raised an eyebrow in question, eyes scanning me and just then noticing the dried blood encrusted near the bottom of my jeans that hadn't quite come off with my vigorous scrubbing the night before. I shrugged at her and attempted a nonchalant air, attempted being the key word there. “Hey, shit happens.”  
She rolled her eyes and set it to the side whilst shooting a disapproving look at a snickering Hughes standing in the background. Next was a blue tie-dye wallet, which she opened and found nothing but spare change because I’m broke and not allowed to drive at the moment. I thanked whatever powers that be that I had forgotten my driver’s license at home; it would have been a pain to explain every aspect of it. Particularly since I had been an organ donor. Doubt they had that in this time frame. Kinda creepy to explain. ‘Yes, if I die it means random Joe number 42 gets my spleen and random Jane number 71 gets my lungs.’ Doubt that would go over too well.   
She pulled out the coins and examined them closely, she glanced up at me, “I’m sorry for being nosy, really, I’ve just never seen currency like this. Where is it from?”  
I froze and blurted out the first name that came to mind.   
“Tatooine.”   
I nearly face-palmed out of shame. Star Wars. I named my little, isolated, island after a planet from Star Wars. I suppose I should feel lucky I didn’t say Gallifrey or some random thing from Dragon Ball Z, but Atlantis might have been a nice name. Then again they did have something resembling Greek myth seeing as Edward Elric told the story of Icarus and his wings of wax, so them knowing a legend similar to Atlantis was possible. Tatooine it is then.  
She gave me a funny look at the name, and before she could ask anything Hughes butt in. “Is that the country you were talking about last night? The one where you’re from?”  
I nodded, “Yeah, I never did tell you much about it last night, sorry about that.”   
I turned back to June, “Those are from my home, I seriously doubt they’re worth anything here, even if melted down. They’re kind of a mishmash of different metals that only have value because the government there said so. I’m just keeping ‘em around for sentimental reasons.”  
She nodded and started placing them back in the wallet but stopped when she reached a rather shiny dime, “What does this number mean? 2001? Is this the value or something?”  
I shook my head, “No, it’s a year.” I could’ve slapped myself. I continued on quickly, “An expiration date of sorts. They were trying to phase out certain types of coins at certain times and transition to paper money. It’s a pretty long-term plan.”  
She stared at it for a second, and I started to worry that she would read everything else on there. I resolved to melt them all into jewelry or something the first opportunity I got. They were much too troublesome. As was my runaway mouth. I understood on some level that I was in shock from everything but that as no excuse to not think things through before blurting them out. Eventually, she put it back in the wallet and set it to the side.  
2 packs of gum, a journal (written in Spanish as practice for the class, thank god, my secrets remain my own), a pair of bright purple socks, some loose peppermints, a zip-lock bag of homemade fudge, an unsharpened pencil, and we had finally arrived at the last item in my bag save the little balls of lint clinging to the bottom. She pulled out the bottle of pills and checked the prescription. Or rather, tried to. She glanced at me, “What language is this?”  
Italian. But I’m not telling her that. I got my prescription when I lived with my grandmother in Sicily. Meaning all information on the bottle could only be read by me here in this wacky dimension, apparently.  
“It’s the language of my country.” Not technically a lie. I’m Italian American. “It’s a small island, extremely isolated.” Slight lie. Island yes if we're talking about where my grandmother lives, small, not really, isolated, hell no.  
She opened the bottle, having no trouble with the child-proof lid and I had to resist the urge to pout. I almost always had issues with it. Idiotic thing nearly cost me my life before.  
“And apparently, it’s very advanced when it comes to medicine. I went to school to be a nurse, but I dropped out, fear of needles, ya know. I’ve never seen something like this.”  
I shrugged, “I couldn’t tell ya much, I’m not a doctor.”  
“What’s this for anyway? Because if its diet pills I’m gunna strangle you, I swear.”  
I laughed a bit, “No, it’s for an illness I’m working to recover from.”  
Hughes suddenly spoke up and I jumped slightly, not expecting him to join the conversation.  
“This illness of yours, you mentioned it last night, I don’t mean to be intrusive but is it deadly without the right treatment?”  
The questioned seemed random; it wasn’t what I was expecting at all. I had up to 13 different responses for possible questions. This one not being one of them. I’m ashamed to say that I was once again shocked honest.  
“Possibly.”  
“Possibly?” the deep voice resonating from behind me caused me to jump once more. I turned to face a questioning Roy Mustang.  
I withheld a fangirl squeal at the sight of him. Some may scold and say get a grip, you’ve seen him before, but those people just don’t understand. This man is Fine.  
Hughes dragged my attention back to the conversation at hand while June packed up my things in the background. “Why would you travel away from where there’s treatment for you when you know you have a potentially deadly illness?”  
“And drag out the time by doing nothing and sitting in a white room being careful not to break myself? No thank you, boredom would kill me first. Besides prolonging my life isn’t really my greatest concern.”  
Hughes looked utterly confused, “Why wouldn’t it be? Do you have a death wish or something?”  
I shook my head, “Of course not, but I want to LIVE, not SURVIVE. Some people live more in 5 years then others do in 20, it’s not the time that matters, it’s the person.” I felt proud of myself that I had managed to slip a Doctor Who quote into a normal conversation on these unsuspecting Amestrians.  
“Besides, this 'illness' of mine is pretty much gone, now it’s just the long and slow road of recovery. All I have to worry about at this point in time is mind over matter. If I let myself fall back into it again I will, but it’s possible to just wing it and power through.”  
I grabbed my bag back from June, and turned to the two military officers, “So, where to now?”  
Mustang gestured silently for us to follow him, seemingly still mulling over what I had said. But then again, he could be thinking about whatever he was gunna have for breakfast, that’s also entirely possible. Hughes and I fell into step behind him, silently navigating the corridors. I geared myself up to answer all questions about why exactly I was in Amestris, praying that I didn’t end this day in a cell because of my runaway mouth.


	6. Chapter 6

I ducked as a combat boot clad foot soared over my head, wondering exactly how this situation had gone from tea time with the military to trying to keep all my limbs attached. Thinking back, I was almost positive that it was that Bastard Mustang’s fault.  
He led us down the twisting corridors of Central HQ and opened the door to his office, ushering us in before him. When the door clanked closed behind me I tried extremely hard not to equate the sound with finality, but failed miserably. He walked behind his desk and sank into his seat with a small sigh, gesturing to the two couches facing one another in front of him.  
For the next twenty minutes there had been inane conversation interspersed with semi-serious conversation over what I planned to do now that I was in Amestris, and no real questions as of yet on HOW I got into the country or where any legal documents were regarding my entrance. This deteriorated into random conversation over my journey here. We had just broached the subject over what I was going to do with myself now that I WAS in the country when the door slammed open and none other than the Fuehrer Bradley flanked by two men in blue uniform marched in.   
Him swanking in and also inquiring about my plans left me at somewhat of a loss. WHY he would inquire about me was also confusing, seeing as I was a random, tiny, insignificant person. And he gave me a creepy vibe, rather than the grandfatherly one I had been expecting. He wasn't a good guy in the other anime, but Taylor had confided in me that Envy, Lust, Gluttony, and Greed were the only homunculi that stayed the same across the board, so there was that which I could lean on. I then informed them of what I saw as my only two options. The civilian life in Central paying the military tax to earn citizenship, or the military route. The moment I mentioned the military route the guard to the Fuehrer’s left lunged for me. In the few seconds it took for him to come near me I slipped into my Mind Retreat and grabbed onto any and all memories I had on martial arts and gymnastics tossing them into the forefront of my mind. I used what little upper body strength I had left over from my short stint in marching band (don’t judge) to break the fall when I dived off the edge of the couch and rolled to a kneeling position facing him, where I could easily avoid or attack. Granted most of the moves I had rolling around in my head came from watching Jackie Chan, Bruce Lee, and Naruto and would most likely be unusable for me but there were a few self-defense moves I knew from my brother, that I could (in theory) use against this guy.  
I had no illusions about winning this fight. I was weak from long-term depression and malnourished, with only working knowledge of martial arts and next to no recent experience. A slight obsession with Naruto in the past led me to take a few martial arts classes, but I hadn’t continued when my health declined. But I sure as hell was gunna at least attempt to muscle memory this shit. The door was out of reach and the window was blocked, so escape wasn't an option.   
All that brings me back to rolling on the floor again to avoid that offending foot. Mustang wasn’t moving, and didn’t look surprised at the attack on a small teenage girl in his office, and wasn’t interfering, most likely meaning he was in on it. Hughes, however, was being held back by the other of the Fuhrers guards. So whatever this was, they hadn’t had time to inform Hughes of it. The fact that Mustang knew meant they had taken time to plan it out, leaving an uneasy feeling in my gut that I had to ignore for the sake of staying in one piece for the next few minutes. I noted the set of the man’s stance and predicted that he would swing wide, leaving an opening.  
When he swung into the punch I gently redirected it with my left hand on his wrist, it was simple to use my smaller size to slip in and jab my right elbow sharply into his solar plexus, spinning around and jabbing my left fist firmly into his stomach, using my left foot to stomp on the tarsal bone in his foot whilst pushing off away from him. Sometimes it pays to have a thinking process quicker than most humans.  
I used the mental image of the body’s map of pressure points, doing lightning fast calculations and matching it up mentally with the man before me. I wasn’t capable of the force necessary for those types of hits to put him down on the ground, but I was able to make him pause and wince, allowing me to get back out of range and into a little breathing room.  
He took a step towards me and I slipped a foot behind me in a halfhearted martial arts ready stance, coming up with over 40 ways to redirect his next attack or dodge around and get the hell out of here. However before he could take another step Bradley raised a hand, a smile still on his face.  
“Sorry about that Miss, but we set up this little test before you got here.”  
I watched warily as the man who attacked me relaxed completely and gave me a grin before going back to his place beside the Fuhrer, along with the man who had been restraining Hughes. Hughes brushed off his rumpled uniform before glancing back up at Bradley.  
“Test?”  
Mustang spoke up, “Due to the only real options available to Miss Arcaro we thought it best to run a few simple tests for if military life would be doable for her.”  
I raised an eyebrow at him, slightly unimpressed, and from his slightly uncomfortable aura, he could tell.  
“So did I ‘pass’ or whatever? What was the particular point of that test? What were the others?”  
Bradley answered for the Colonel. “I would say you did very well on that last test. The point was only for reflexes, and to see if you could at least dodge or comprehend that you were under attack. However, you took it a step further and attacked right back. It would seem you already have a rudimentary knowledge of combat. However, we’ll have to work on your bodily strength. You are a bit on the tiny side.”  
I suppressed the strong urge to sweat drop at the tiny comment because this was coming from the man that passed the Fullmetal Alchemist.  
He continued, “The other tests were simple and inconsequential at the moment, slipped into the conversation by our dear Colonel and testing your intellect.”  
I shot Mustang a confused look, but Hughes face lit up in comprehension and he pointed at the Colonel accusingly. “Is that why I couldn’t follow half of the conversation?”  
I furrowed my brow in thought, thinking back to the conversation. There hadn’t been anything that difficult, just some political theory, a bit of geo-sciences, and some mentions of foreign cultures I had ‘encountered in my travels’ which I bullshited from history class- oh. I’m a stupid genius. Most people my age, or at all based on Hughes reaction, wouldn't have that shit fluttering around in the front of their brains. This time, I really did sweat drop. None of it had been specifics of this country that I wouldn’t have known but Hughes would have, just generalizations that tested the waters in many different areas.  
Bradley chuckled at my expression, “Relax Miss Arcaro, after all, you have secured a place in boot camp.”  
I paled rapidly, “Eh, say-what-now?”  
“Boot camp, I’m going to throw you in with the rest of the new recruits and you’re either going to build up some muscle or drop out for civilian life. If you can’t handle it Miss, then you can always drop out at the weekly check in with your assigned officer.”  
Oh, no, he did NOT just emphasize the Miss in that sentence. I’ll show that sexist bastard- wait, that was his intention. Damn.  
Bradley: 2   
Me: Zippo, at the moment.  
“And who might my assigned officer be?”  
Bradley motioned his head at the Colonel, “Unfortunately our dear Mustang has to return back to his post at East headquarters, so the only one left with the appropriate connection to you is Lt. Colonel Hughes. He will be checking up on you during evening mess every Wednesday.”  
At a sudden signal from Bradley his two henchmen each grabbed onto one of my arms, one handing my bag to Hughes, and then steering me out of the room. “We’re going to get you a physical and then off you’ll go!”  
He cheerfully led the way out and I looked over my shoulder at the shocked Hughes and resigned looking Mustang, “Look after my coat, would ya? Sentiment and all that, all I have left of my brother.”  
When I got a nod from Hughes I looked forward and stopped dragging my heels, walking with the men instead.  
At least this solved my issue of how to get close enough to change things. If Hughes was my assigned officer I would most likely end up in his unit afterward because he had such a close handle on my training.  
On the downside, I now had to go through a hellish stay in military boot camp. Then there was the real motive behind allowing me to join, I'd been admitting to my horrible health left and right because it's not something to be kept to myself. If I'm going to be around these people for a while like Hughes had implied they needed to know in case shit went sideways. So I had a million mysteries on my hands and the gates of metaphorical hell open before me. Joy. There had better be freaking soda in this mess hall they mentioned.


	7. Chapter 7

I lazily poked the thing on my tray that the staff of the mess hall insisted was food. I could have sworn that it was staring back at me in all of its sludgy glory. I glanced up at Maes who was looking at it with equal trepidation, turning slightly pale when it continued to giggle for several long seconds after it was touched. He commented absentmindedly, “Does science even allow for that?”  
I looked back at the sludge apathetically, “Nope.”  
He shivered, “All right, with that out of the way, how are you doing?”  
It was the 5th Wednesday meeting, though he hadn't made every Wednesday, and I was the farthest I had been from quitting. That first Wednesday had been killer. Maes had barely walked in the door of the mess hall and I was hanging from his back like a demented koala bear, begging him to smuggle in some caffeine for me. He had promptly shrugged me off into a chair and slid an old fashioned bottle of soda onto the table. He was halfway through asking if I needed help opening the top when there was a soft ‘pop’ and suddenly half of it was gone. Apparently, my thought about soda in the mess hall was spoken out loud and remembered by the considerate Lt. Colonel. I had been worried about finding a fix for my addiction because of the cultural differences between Amestris and America, but the term soda still came from the sodium salts in carbonated water. Lucky me.   
I looked up at Hughes, trying to read his expression. The first few weeks he’d had trouble leaving me behind in this place. That first meeting, after the whole soda incident he finally got a good look at me. I was even skinnier than when he had first seen me, a frightening sight to behold. Every part of me hurt in ways I didn’t know was possible and the food was looking at me. When I told him the last part he had lightened up a little, but still kept asking if I was sure I wished to stay. When he asked why I would just shrug, and change the subject. The real reason was my sanity. I hadn’t had anything close to an attack while in the boot camp. There was no time to slip too deep into my mind; I had to focus all of my energy completely on survival.  
By meeting five I no longer hurt all the time, and had put on a little bit of muscle. Not enough to look strange on my small form, but enough to keep me alive in the exercises. I was built like a gymnast, and still had too little weight for ‘lady problems’ to even think of tripping me up every month. All in all, I was doing pretty well. Not to mention I was kicking ass in the theory work. When they said we were moving the afternoon exercises into the classroom the training unit I was in had been split down the middle in reactions. Half were horrified at going back to ‘school’ and the rest were thrilled to be getting away with the torture of the physical workouts. When our first test was the day after the material was introduced I knew that this was going to be mainly to test dedication. They wanted to see who would get the material, work their ass off until nightfall and then study until lights out.  
I’m pretty sure I blew the instructors minds with my perfect scores in every test. When it came time to move on to weaponry any sort of rifle was ruled out because most of them were bigger than me. I was decent at most handguns, but I was certainly no Hawkeye. Putting it together and taking it apart again was no problem, because once again, memorization. Overall my scores were okay.  
I grinned at Hughes, “I’m alright, I think. It’s getting bit boring now, there’s nothing really new being introduced lately.” He rolled his eyes.  
“That’s probably because it’s your last week; they’re winding down, and smoothing out those last few quirks, I doubt they have anything new left to teach.”  
I looked up from my tray, eyes wide, “It’s the last week?”  
He nodded, looking a bit amused, “Yeah, Friday I’ll be back to pick you up and take you to your new apartment on base, if you decide to stay that is. After you drop off your stuff we’ll go through the paperwork for everything, and find a place for you.”  
Only another day and half until freedom, well, sort of.

By the time Friday rolled around I was bouncing around the place like some sort of pixie on crack. I was waiting by the main door to the training compound, an officer sitting at his desk nearby, waiting to sign out anyone qualified to leave. I had a small military issue bag that included two sets of uniforms (complete with pants, I had the option to refuse the skirt apparently), toiletries, and the paperwork to apply for a weapon. I would have to get a military ID number before I could turn those in.  
I scanned again for Hughes and finally spotted him, I tried to run towards him only to be intercepted by the officer. “Not quite yet missy, we have to get you signed out first before you can leave.”  
I scowled, but nodded, waiting impatiently for him and Hughes to finish their customary greetings and then the required paperwork. After what seemed like an eternity Hughes was leading me out of the building and to another one on what seemed like the other side of the compound. It was a grueling walk, and normally I would have been huffing and puffing and terrorizing pigs in stick houses, but after a rough month of military training, I was feeling pretty good. Better than I had felt in a while actually.  
My apartment was on the 3rd floor, in the east section of the main headquarters compound, with a tiny bedroom, bathroom, and kitchen/living room. I wasn’t complaining, though, especially when I saw my bag from home on the small couch, accompanied my carefully folded jacket, pockets undisturbed. I could probably thank modern quality for that, the inside pockets most likely wouldn’t even be found unless you knew where they were already.  
We sat down at the small table in the kitchen/living room and he spread the paperwork in front of me.  
“Normally new recruits aren’t given anything more substantial than grunt work for the grunts, but according to your test scores in certain areas, I’m willing to bend things a little. I’ve had you assigned to my unit in investigations. I hope you can handle long hours and little sleep.”  
I almost couldn’t believe my luck. I got where I needed to be, with minimal effort. Of course, I had gone a little above and beyond for any bit of work that could be tied into the investigative branch, so maybe I had skewed my chances in my favor. A little.  
With a signature and my ID handed to me as well as a small amount of cash for food and other such necessities, which I assume was training pay, I was left to acquaint myself with my new home. I decided to put off the shopping for food a bit, and instead enjoyed my first HOT shower in a long while. After dressing my once again military issue sweat pants and undershirt I resolved to buy some casual clothing and drifted to sleep.

A few weeks into my new life and I had been faced with almost every criminal investigation imaginable, from fraud to drugs, with a murder here and there. Hughes didn’t really question my ability to keep every file in his office meticulously in place, but worshiped it whenever paperwork seemed to be breeding and he could just hand it to me to fix the problem. I knew quite a few people around the base and the staff in the main cafeteria knew my routine well enough that they could hand me what I wanted without me saying a word.  
Hughes wasn’t joking about long hours and little sleep. If I hadn’t had a caffeine dependency before I would have developed one quickly. On top of the ridiculous case load we had I had taken it upon myself to stay fit, even after leaving boot camp. I ran at the track every morning around dawn, switching up the theme of the day, between how long I could go and how fast I could make a certain number of loops around. My small size made for ridiculous speed, which I was grateful for, because I was positive my future would be full of running away from the conflict to leave room for the real fighters to do their jobs.  
My nights, when not filled with endless streams of paperwork, were dedicated to finding whatever I could in the state library that had to do with alchemy. I even went so far as to locate Doctor Marco’s books and give them a read through. However I was by far no alchemist and couldn’t spot the code for the life of me, so I left it alone. First starting out I had been terrified of alchemy for several reasons. One being that something would wrong and I would accidentally kill myself with it, and another being that it simply wouldn’t work because of the fact that I wasn’t originally from this dimension.  
My first transmutation had put one of those fears to rest. My slightly demented statue of Batman had come out looking more like the Hunchback of Notre Dame. I began planning ruthlessly for Hughes death, centering any theory I had to save him on alchemy, and doing small-scale experiments to test the likeliness of their success. It took me 3 weeks to finally come across a plan I liked that didn’t seem overtly stupid at first or even second glance, and I began slowly gathering the supplies needed for the real thing, taking the money out of my food budget and cutting back a little on luxuries like dinner that I didn’t quite need for survival. While some bits of it bordered the lines of human transmutation I took heart at the fact that I wasn’t touching human souls, so technically I was clear.  
I was getting close to ready, really close, when it happened. I was sitting in my desk, in an the corner of Hughes office calmly going through photos of a dismembered woman for the wrap-up of a cold case when Hughes swept in, grabbing his gun from his desk, as well as several other items and stashing them in his trench coat.  
“Come on Steph, Roy’s got some troubling brewing at Eastern command, we have an express military cargo train waiting for our team and a few others going for other reasons, we should be there before sundown.” I looked out the window behind his desk at the dark sky, not even showing a hint of the sun rising yet and sighed, but grabbed all of my gear anyway. I pulled on my own trench coat and added my handgun to the holster, and grabbing my bag from home. It was still my everyday bag, carrying everything I would need for anything from a murder case to a shopping trip.  
“What kind of trouble, boss?”  
At the first mention of the nickname ‘boss’ a few weeks ago Hughes had protested venomously. I had only been making a reference to NCIS Special Agent Gibbs, but if it bothered him that badly I was gunna keep it, because I'm a little shit like that.  
He had stopped rolling his eyes by now, it was slightly disappointing.  
“Fullmetal trouble, with a side of insane bio-state alchemist.”  
Tucker. Alexander. Nina. Hughes death was getting close and I was running out of time. I ran after Hughes, determined not to let him out of my sight, even if his death was a ways off. By the time we were on the train to Easter command I was over the shock of the progression of events, and attempting to prepare myself for the crime scene ahead of me.  
Dead men- handled.  
Dead women- ew, and hitting a bit close to home, I am female myself after all.  
Dead children- no one can really stomach that.   
I leaned my head against the window attempting to catch some sleep; I hadn’t been home yet from the night before and was desperately in need of some shut eye. The murder scene would still be there when I woke up. Unfortunately. As well as the guilt and insidious whispers in my mind that told me I should have done something about this, despite the lack of resources or solid timeline.


	8. Chapter 8

I was shaken awake after what seemed like moments. I glared blearily up at Hughes, who was wearing an unusually somber expression.  
“We’re almost there, gather your gear.”  
I sighed, rubbing the sleep from my eyes, and standing to give a cat-like stretch. My back gave several sickening pops, followed soon after by the joints of my ankles, knees, elbows, and shoulders. I was just cracking my neck when Hughes walked back into the compartment.  
“Getting your game on already?”  
I scowled lightly, but didn’t comment. He had long since picked up on the fact that I wasn’t taking a situation seriously until I went through my little routine of loosening all of my joints like that. Some old discrepancy in calcium intake when I was a child ended with the frequent popping and catching. If I cracked them ahead of time they’d move easier. Because of that I had taken to cracking all of them before seriously tackling a case.  
Hughes thought it was just a way to switch frames of mind, but in reality it was to keep my limbs from seizing up and not moving at an important (or embarrassing) time. I was already full of illness and weakness, and there was no reason to give him another. It was already a miracle I'd passed the physical anyway.  
By the time we had reached the city our debriefing was complete. Five of us were there from Centrals investigative department to complete the investigation. All of us were reluctant to see the ‘evidence.’ A young girl, his own daughter.  
While I had known it was coming that didn’t mean that I still wasn’t shocked. Some part of me had stupidly hoped that my Intel was wrong, that maybe the anime had been slightly inaccurate in some areas. The guiltier part, the part I’m ashamed to have, was glad that it was right. It meant that my other information was right as well. I quickly shoved that part down, punching her in the face, shoving her in a disused closet somewhere in my mind retreat, locking the door, and putting the imaginary key into my imaginary blender.

Our arrival at the crime scene showed it already cordoned off; with sheets covering two lumps on the ground that smelled sickeningly like burned human flesh. I was familiar with the smell from my last encounter with it, a week long investigation into an arson case that turned out to be an electrical fire. Accident or no accident, the woman was still roasted. At that thought I zoned out a little, staring at the plastic, when had I gotten so morbid? I wasn’t exactly all sunshine, daisies, and kittens before, but this was ridiculous. Maybe that was the screwed up military mindset of this weird-ass made up country. I’d been infected.  
I shivered at the thought and went to pull up the yellow tape to walk through but found it already held high over my head. My eyes followed it to the pale hand holding it in place and found Colonel Mustang looking at me, a slightly concerned expression on his face.  
“Are you alright Sergeant Arcaro?” Confusion reigned for a second, before I remembered that I had just been standing in front of a crime scene, staring at the cadavers, and I had only just joined this shitshow recently. He thought I was getting all squeamish like a rookie. Sadly, I had acclimated a while ago.  
I shook my head in an attempt to clear it; a superior officer (and main freakin’ character) was waiting patiently for my answer. “Yeah, I’m fine, just got lost in my thoughts. Sorry sir; won’t let it happen again.”  
He examined me for a long moment before nodding and motioning me ahead with his free hand, but I noticed he didn’t seem too convinced. I strode forward, carefully avoiding the pools of blood, per my CSI training (yes they have that here, no I don’t mean the show) and made my way to where I had seen Hughes disappear. I was just stepping into the room when I felt a large hand close on the upper part of my left arm, attempting to pull me back before I stepped through. They weren’t quick enough, because I caught sight of the gruesome mess on the floor that used to be Nina and Alexander. I wasn’t supposed to know that however, so I played dumb, turning to Mustang, who had attempted to spare me the mangled spectacle.  
“What happened here? I thought we were here to investigate illegal alchemy, not several brutal murders!”  
Mustang looked over my shoulder for a second and made a motion with his hand, then turned me around and lead the way into the room. The body of Ni-the Chimera (if I think of it as a child one more time I’m going to faint or puke) was now covered with a plastic sheet like the bodies outside. Mustang made his way over to Hughes and I followed. Hughes looked up, and asked the same thing I did.  
“What happened here?”  
Mustang didn’t remove his eyes from the tarp at his feet. “They were attacked. The guards outside, Tucker, and his daughter, all combusted from the inside.” Hughes' eyes widened.  
“You mean like the Alchemist killers MO?”  
Mustang nodded, not moving. When a second passed in silence I decided to get the plot moving, hoping to save a certain blonde a few broken limbs.  
“Where are the Elrics?”  
They both turned to look at me, uncomprehending. I rolled my eyes, allowing a small bit of urgency to coat my tone.  
“The Fullmetal alchemist? Running around alone with his little brother when a dangerous serial killer known for targeting state alchemists is suspected to be in town?”  
The color visibly drained from the already pale Colonel, and Hughes understood a half second later, his own face following suit. Mustang practically ran out of the room, barking out orders. Hughes and I followed behind, jumping into the vehicle we had arrived in, and setting out to help search for the brothers. It didn’t take long for us to find them; frankly we just followed the sound of explosions. Any hope I held for us arriving earlier than in the anime due to my intervention was crushed. They were well into their confrontation already. As we screeched to a stop Mustang was already set up to fire upon Scar. Hawkeye swept his feet out from under him as we approached, and I drew my weapon. I saw Armstrong from the corner of my eye and wondered how I had missed him before. He came here from Central, meaning we should have been somewhere on the same train. I dismissed the thought for later, instead focusing on the serial killer in front of us.  
I didn’t bother attempting a shot; I knew that if Hawkeye could barely graze him after a lifetime of sharpshooting I wouldn’t stand a chance, I had never so much as finished off my first box of bullets yet. It was thrilling, yet terrifying, with all of the alchemy flying around. I hesitantly stepped up next to the other soldiers, raising my weapon, preparing to back up Armstrong, at least holding the weapon at the ready so I didn’t feel as useless as I actually was. Before I could even complete the action Hughes pulled me back with him, hiding slightly behind the car.  
I gave him a sour look but stayed where I was. It proceeded exactly as it was supposed to, but it was much more exciting (read as terrifying) in person. I made yet another mental note to create some sort of jewelry with an alchemic array of some sort so that I wouldn’t get caught completely off guard and unarmed by someone as dangerous as these people. I wasn't the best at alchemy, but even something was better than nothing.   
Hughes popped up as normal, going on about not joining a fight of mutants. I rolled my eyes, looking over to where Edward was getting patched up so he could make it to the hospital for a formal checkup. I then looked at the hole in the ground where Scar had disappeared. I hadn’t noticed that my gun was still in my hand, hanging at my side with my hands still trembling slightly from what I assumed was after-adrenaline weakness, until glove covered hands softly relieved me of the weapon. I looked up, finally tuning into the conversation, to notice the two officers were looking at me with something akin to worry. I blinked slowly, “I’m sorry did you say something?”  
Mustang sighed, still holding my gun, “I asked if you were alright. When was the last time you’ve eaten? You’re still looking as thin as when I last saw you.”  
I grimaced, “Am not.”  
He looked me in the eye and raised an eyebrow. “You didn’t answer my question, when did you last eat?”  
I looked to Hughes for help, but he was as stern as Mustang. I tried to appeal to him anyway. “What does it matter when I last ate, there are more important things going on.”  
Hughes grabbed my shoulders, looking into my eyes, “It matters because you’re trembling, and you don’t get frightened from this kind of violence, just look at your day job. You’re tiny, but with nerves of steel, and it’s our jobs to worry about our subordinates, so excuse us for worrying about your health. When did you eat?”  
I glanced at the grey sky, thinking back, “Err, I had lunch on Wednesday.”  
Hughes deadpanned, “it's Saturday.”  
I shrugged, “I was planning to eat dinner when I got home, but Stevens handed off the requisition forms to me, so I was still there when you came in and said to get on the train.”  
“You didn’t go home?”  
“It happens.”  
Hughes groaned, dragging both hands down his face. “Come on then, I’ll take you with the Elrics and get you something at the hospital while I take their statements. You need to take better care of yourself, the military can be extremely hard on the body, and you have to be ready for the strain of something like this.”  
I rolled my eyes but copied him as he saluted Mustang and we were dismissed. As we were walking away I heard Mustang make one last parting remark, “No skirt, Arcaro?”  
I rolled my eyes as Hughes snickered, glancing back over my shoulder to give him a halfhearted glare, his deep laugh floating behind us as we made our way to the car.  
It was a lighthearted moment, I didn't feel like ruining it by explaining that it wasn't about taking care of myself, or even about that past 'illness'. Now sometimes I wanted to eat, wasn't stopped by those old feelings of nausea. But now I was in a foreign country impossibly far from home in a culture that sometimes made zero sense. The food had an off quality to it, sometimes things just aren't the same here. But Hughes doesn't need to know that, doesn't need to know this isn't absentmindedness, but rather homesickness. Let him think this is something he can fix.


	9. Chapter 9

I resigned myself to hospital food, but consoled myself with the fact that at least they had chicken soup. It wasn’t the best I had ever had, and it possessed that tinge of 'wrong' to it like every other food here, but I managed to choke it down. The entire time I was examining my journal. Not my personal journal, that stays at home encoded and in spanish to boot. This was my ‘plot journal’. It was also encoded extremely thoroughly. I made up my own language, using memories of images of old high Gallifreyan as a starting point, and ending with the perfect 'eternity code'. Thank you, Artemis Fowl.  
Initially I had been nervous about the likeness to transmutation circles but as I learned more about alchemy I realized they weren't very much alike at all. People might look at me funny but they only thought I was dabbling in science. In the end it worked out better than I ever could have hoped. Any time I needed to sketch an actual transmutation circle but didn’t want an alchemist to be able to look at it and tell what I was up to I would simply write it out in Russian letters that would correspond to the English stroke that would make a certain line in the Gallifreyan version, giving me a transmutation noted down in word form with everyone but me none the wiser. They would have to sift through at least two different layers of code.  
I thought about encoding the Russian letters inside some kind of Russian poetry but figured I would save that idea for later, right now I didn’t have that kind of time to bother translating and encoding like that. Not with MD-Day so close. I had taken to calling it that. Maes death day. It made me nervous to even think about but I used my newly found military backbone and shoved my worries elsewhere while I worked on a solution.  
I was popping open my 3rd soda in the past hour when I sensed someone looking over my shoulder. I calmly continued with the simple circle for ‘and’ trying to tie up my paragraph so I could get back to Hughes. It’s not like it’d mean anything to them. The deep voice that resonated from behind me startled me, nearly causing me to spill my soda. Instinct saved my precious drink and I barely caught it as Roy continued speaking.  
“What are working on? Those circles are just nonsense, they’d never actually accomplish anything.”  
I glanced up at him then away again. Those dark eyes are seriously unfair. “I don’t expect them to accomplish anything. They’re just pretty little doodles. The real stuff is hidden among them.” I flipped the pages over to a page that I had marked with a small doodle of an animal in the corner, this time a penguin. The animal doodles were signals that the page was useless and not actually a part of anything. Those pages had simple circles that I had come up with and that actually worked. A few didn’t but came close and I had notes on them in Russian out to the side. It could be explained to allies that these were the real research hidden inside nonsense. And it was real research. Just not the kind I was focused on at the moment.  
I handed him the journal, pointing to the animal. “Taylor here means that the page has actual stuff on it.”  
He looked it over with an Alchemist’s critical eye. “That’s actually kind of genius. Hiding the useful ones inside nonsense and then coding the words all the way through to avoid suspicion.” He blinked suddenly and then took a closer look at the letters. For a second I thought he was reading it and started having a mini-heart attack but he looked up and asked in astonishment, “Is this Drachman?!”  
I looked at him cluelessly. “Drachman? Never heard of it. My Aunt Liz taught me this.”  
Which was true. She had done a bit of Russian ballet in her mid-teens, and had made sure that both Taylor and I spoke at least enough to not get hopelessly lost when she took us on trips to visit her friends there. Me being me I ended up learning quite a bit more than that.  
He gave me an appraising look, as if suddenly completely reevaluating my worth. I did my military best not to fidget uncomfortably under his gaze. He snapped the book closed, eyes never leaving my face. “Are you fluent in the language that goes with those letters, or is it just letter to letter replacement?” I started for a second, on edge that he had accidently guessed the way part of my journal was coded. It looked like I would have to look into that poem thing sooner than I thought.  
“I’m fluent, reading, writing, speaking, the whole package. Liz liked to use it to leave notes around the house and to tell us things in public, to keep nosy people out of our business.”  
Also true. Liz was Queen Paranoid Worry-Wort if ever there was one.  
He looked at me for a second longer before handing my journal back and abruptly changing the subject. “Hughes wanted to see you, I came to fetch you for him.”  
I raised my eyebrows at him while sticking the journal into one of my many inside coat pockets. “A lofty Colonel fetching things for his subordinates? Oh, what would command say?” My mocking tone forced a surprised laugh out of him, before he rolled his eyes and motioned for the door. I held up a single finger and grabbed two more bottles of pop, flashed my military ID so it could be added on to my meal tab, and shoved them into my bag. I grabbed the one I had open and then headed for the door. “Alright, now we can leave.”  
I didn’t look over my shoulder at him, too busy thinking about why Hughes couldn’t have come to get me himself. I worried for a second but mentally scolded myself. He had been fine when I last saw him and most likely still was.  
My mental question was answered when Mustang cleared his throat awkwardly and I glanced up at him to see he was watching the ceiling as we walked.  
“So...how are you adjusting to military life so far?”  
It wasn’t the oddest of questions, but the way he forced it out set off a red flag or two.  
“Just fine, thanks. Did Hughes put you up to this?”  
He deflated almost instantly,  
“Yes. He seems to think that since it’s my fault you’re in this at all because of my ‘conspiring with Bradley’.”  
“...well to be fair, he has a point.”  
He groaned and I rolled my eyes, continuing,  
“But I likely would have ended up here anyway if I could have managed it. What I really didn’t understand were the tests, surely that’s not how it’s done here with every prospective recruit?”  
There was only silence for a few moments and we turned down two hallways before he answered.  
“Not exactly. He said he had a ‘feeling’ about you, Bradley I mean. Hughes insists it means you’re destined for greatness or something.”  
I nearly fell on my face, scowling.  
“So it’s the eccentric whim of an old guy that got me a job despite possible severe past and future health issues, is that it?”  
He snorted before looking around to make sure no one heard the undignified noise coming from him,  
“I wouldn’t phrase it like that, but essentially, yes.”  
I was still scowling when he was stopped by someone or another and sent me ahead, I headed back to the Elrics room by memory trying to ignore the implications of the conversation I’d just had. As I approached I heard the low murmur of voices from inside. I knocked on the door frame before I stepped inside, eyes locking on Hughes once they found him. I noted that all conversation stopped once I announced my presence and filed the fact away for later. “The Colonel said you needed me?”  
He nodded, “We’re leaving soon. We’re handing jurisdiction back over the local department now that we have no live witnesses to return to central, nor an alchemist to put on trial.” We carefully pretended to not notice how the Elrics had stiffened at the mention of the Tuckers. “Once I’m finished here we’ll head back to the station and then head home.”  
I was sent back outside while they finished hashing out their plans for the Elrics, trying not to laugh at the fact that I already knew most of what was being said anyway. The two brothers would be heading back to Resembool to get Ed’s automail fixed, and would run into Marco. I had already made sure that Scheska had read the notes by turning them in to her station after trying to decode them myself. I did my best not to tremble at the thought of how close it was to the secret of the stone and the death of Hughes. It was getting close to showtime and I had yet to write all of the lines for every part.


	10. Chapter 10

My plans were finalized. It was the day before I was going to actually prepare for the final transmutation, the most dangerous one. The one that I was sure was going to go right but had so many places that it could go wrong. There was little I could do about it though, I had run calculations, done small test runs, and everything was as ready as it could ever be.  
I had stolen a peek at Hughes medical records weeks before the Ni-no, the Chimera incident and had done some ingenious (if I do say so myself) alchemy that copied it onto papers that I took with me. They were the key to part of the success of this venture. The other was how to convince a Homunculus to look the other way for about 12 seconds while I put part of my plan into action. THAT was still mostly ongoing, although what I’d written in my journal to make my plans ‘complete’ was ‘wing-it, bitch’. Not my brightest moment.  
My pen was hovering over that particular part of circle and I was close to striking it out and trying again when a hand descended on my shoulder. I jerked my head up, my eyes meeting Hughes, and he smiled sadly. I panicked for a second, half expecting he knew what I was writing about, but then he spoke,  
“You’ve been here since dawn yesterday, it’s almost noon. Go home, go to sleep, and for God’s sake, eat something. Alchemy and the military will still be here when you get back.”   
I nodded, relief stretching through me. It would be nice to sleep, if my brain would let me. The case load the past week had been particularly difficult to wade through, and one of them was a cold case for the ages. A closed room mystery that would baffle future generations, just like it did me. I had looked through the evidence, the scene, any and all viable witness statements, and when Hughes asked my opinion on what had happened my answer had ended up being,  
“Fuck if I know.”  
My report had been worded slightly different of course.  
Stretching out my stiff muscles, I rose from my seat, not bothering to move anything around, it had all been sorted before I brought out my notebook. Truthfully all of my paperwork was done, I could plan and theorize from home. This plan was shot to shit when Maes snatched the journal from where I was attempting to stuff it in my bag.  
“Ah, ah, ah. Can’t have you working through the night again anyway, Sergeant. I don’t want you working on anything, you hear me?”  
With a salute, and a bit of grumbling I was out the door, doing my best not to freak out over the lost journal. I knew all of the important stuff by heart obviously, and that wasn’t my only copy of the most needed circles, plus it was secure as hell, but my pocket felt empty without it. It was like I was a mother whose child was staying the night at Grandma’s, you knew they were safe, you have some peace and quiet with them gone, but still, they weren’t in sight…  
These thoughts disappeared when I noticed Major Armstrong coming my way. He was a very intense person, which tended to scare people away, but underneath it all he was sweet and kind, and that was enough for me to like him. That mustache though...I had a journal of assassination plans for people I didn’t like with a whole chapter just for that stupid mustache. They only thing stopping me was his obvious love for it. If there was ever a split second of hesitation from him over it, the thing was gone.  
I stepped to the side and saluted, as per etiquette but he stopped and greeted me. Nothing too unusual about that but what was unusual was how totally serious he was being when he asked me to accompany him somewhere. I didn’t hesitate to follow him. Knowing from the show, and then in person, lead me to trust him more than others. If someone were to be sent to lead me to a dark corner to be shot it wouldn’t be the Major.  
Our destination turned out to be an office filled with more tech than I had ever seen so far in the entirety of Amestris. It didn’t hold a candle to all the crap in a modern American home, or even the average Modern American teenage bedroom, but it was a shittone of stuff for this place. I gazed around in wonder at the stuff, filing away the era some of it came from back in my world, and filtering through what I knew of it, trying my best to move away from anything I knew came afterward. If I slipped and did something too amazing and future-y then they would stick me with technology for the rest of my life and I could kiss Intelligence goodbye.   
An officer I didn’t know was standing in the middle of the room looking at the tech. When he acknowledged my presence we went through the whole salute routine, then he turned to Armstrong to have him explain. He obligingly motioned to the screen, and what was unmistakably the recording of a phone call.  
“Colonel Mustang mentioned in passing that you have some mastery of Drachman that you learned in your home country. We were hoping that you could use this magnificent skill passed down through your family to translate some worrying interactions made by one of the officers.”  
I remembered that Mustang mistook Russian for this ‘Drachman’ stuff, so I just gave a mental shrug and with a “What the hell, why not.”  
I put on the earphones and accepted the pen and paper they handed me, transcribing the conversation with no difficulty. Huh, apparently ‘Drachma’ was this place’s version of Russia. I handed the paper to the man who had identified himself as Lieutenant General Raven. He was one of the few dark-skinned people that I had seen, apart from the Ishbalan, Scar, and had white hair, and a light grayish beard. He seemed friendly enough, but that gleam in his eye as he observed the paper made me re-think it. But I was again re-thinking my suspicion once he turned back to me, I was unsure if the look had even been there in the first place.  
Thus, I ended up in yet another dreary office, this time translating written Drachman transmissions. I was hoping that I would actually get home and actually get to sleep, but I should have known that was unlikely. I was going to have to begin my plan to save Maes whenever I got home next, with little to no time for sleep. Edward and Alphonse could be back any day now, and the burning of the library could already be occurring for all I know. I didn’t have a snowballs chance in hell of stopping Lust from destroying the building but I had memorized all texts that I had found that could possibly be useful and would be almost impossible to find anywhere else. In a moment of weakness I had checked out a couple of Hughes favorites a few days ago, so that they would escape the destruction completely. They were sitting safely at home beside my bed which is where I wished I could be…  
It was with this daydream of sleep that the man himself appeared before me. He gave me a stern look,  
“What are you doing? I gave you an express order to eat something, go home, and sleep!”  
I mustered enough energy to give a halfhearted wave at Raven, who had noticed the intrusion and stalked our way.  
“Ah, Lt. Colonel. I borrowed your man for the day, I hope you don’t mind. She has an invaluable skill that we were desperately in need of.”  
Hughes watched me struggle to write in a straight line, inwardly cursing the Amestrians who didn’t use lined paper, the bastards…  
“Lieutenant General, the Sergeant hasn’t slept or eaten in days. I had just given direct orders for her to go home.”  
“Which I overruled...I apologize for the mix-up, I didn’t know about the standing orders. Sergeant?”  
At the acknowledgment of my presence, I looked up, blinking like an owl in the light that haloed him.  
“Go home, you’ve done plenty here. If anything pressing comes up, we’ll find you again. For now, great job, get some rest. You deserve it.”  
The praise was warming but dulled slightly by the ache in my bones, and the throbbing pain behind my eyes.  
Leaving the office was mostly a blur, so was getting home, but I made sure to close and lock the door, all too aware of the dangers of being one of the few females on base. I eyed the bathroom, and debated taking a shower, but gravity suddenly shifted from pulling towards the center of the Earth to pulling directly to the bed. I managed to kick off my boots and pull off the uniform jacket before falling into bed, promising myself a warm shower and good food as soon as morning rolled around. Something hit me like lightning, and I shot straight up in the dark. Armstrong. He was traveling with the Elrics, but he was at the office with Raven. The Elrics hadn’t returned. Envy was in central already. The homunculi were here.

Elsewhere in the city a certain Blonde was stepping off the train to be met with his new guards, and terrible news.


	11. Chapter 11

Piles of notes were scattered all over the room, forgotten in the tide of work, tossed aside by a golden haired hurricane. By my side I heard Hughes whistle, sounding almost impressed with the complete and utter chaos before him. I looked from the room, to him, back the room.

“ _ I’m _ not cleanin’ it up.”

Maes chuckled slightly before stepping into the room and trying to gain the brothers attention. 

"Yo! How’s progress going, you guys?” 

Edward waved a hand at us distractedly, pulling a book from the bottom of a pile and only barely avoiding being squished by the rest of them when Ross rushed to right the cascade. She attempted a respectful salute, all while trying to save the eldest Elric from an untimely demise via literature. Maes spoke with the poor bodyguards while I made my way over to Alphonse, who was less absorbed in the work than his brother. He looked up as I approached, waving slightly, 

“Stephanie! How has the military been treating you? We didn’t really get to talk much last time we saw one another.” 

I could sense the approaching gloom that always appeared when anyone mentioned the Tuckers, and quickly moved to intercept it.

“I’ve been alright. Occupied is the word I suppose. Drowning might be appropriate too, now that I think of it. How have you guys been? Making any progress on this stuff?” 

Wrong move. The gloom was back, 

“Not much progress. Marcoh coded his notes very well. I’m starting to think we might never get my- um that is, never find what we’re looking for.”

The correction confused me, until I recalled that I wasn’t supposed to know what the brothers were looking for, or what had happened in their pasts. I simply smiled at him confidently, 

“Oh, you’ll find whatever it is. The both of you have enough intelligence and dedication for ten men.” 

I don’t know how, but it seemed like the armour managed to convey a grin. I looked around at the mess,

“I’d offer to help but honestly my knowledge of Alchemy isn’t where I wish, and from the looks of this it doesn’t even fall into my niche.”

This stirred what seemed like even more interest than he had had for my foreign origins. 

“You know Alchemy?” 

I shrugged, not sure if it would be wise to admit to much at this stage, so close to my goal. 

“I dabble. It started as pure curiosity, we don’t have real alchemy where I’m from. It’s myth, legend, fantasy, a fairy tale. Rulers of ancient dynasties drinking Mercury because they thought it was the key to eternal life. The irony in THAT almost hurts.” 

Al laughed, then jumped up, as if struck by something.

“Um, excuse me for a second, I need to talk to my brother about something.”

He rushed off and I glanced at the pages he had been holding, trying to see what he’d found, but the code remained solidly out of my reach. I heard muffled grumbling from Ed about the disturbance, then only muffled whispers about whatever it was Al wanted to talk to him about. It was a full three minutes before Al returned, this time with Edward in tow. That caught the attention of Hughes, who wandered over to where we were gathered. Al nervously fiddled with a book in his hands for a second before he spoke, 

“Stephanie, can I ask you a question about your country?”

I looked at him for a second before shrugging, confident that I had enough answers prepared to handle what he threw at me. 

“Sure, fire away.”

He seemed to glance at his brother, who hesitated before nodding slightly. 

“What do your people have to say about the philosophers stone?”

I never once expected them to ask me about that. Now that I think of it, I should have. It makes sense to ask people about the different legends in different places, especially somewhere as far away as my ‘country’. It also warmed my heart slightly, that they trusted me enough to ask me about their ultimate goal. Then again they could just be that desperate. 

I seriously considered the question for a second before answering. 

“Well, there are many legends about a stone, be it the Philosophers stone, the sorcerer's stone, or the elixir of life. I’ve come across a few with theories that said the stone can turn base metals into gold or silver, heal any ailment, bring dead crops back to abundance. Some say that it can only be created when one has achieved true understanding of all geometric knowledge, and others say that it is not created by human hand like homunculi but that it is compressed in the center of colliding stars and pieces of one may fall to the Earth every other millennia or so. I don’t put much stock in those legends though. After all, they are just legend. Sorry I can’t be much help.” 

Edward was thinking hard about what I had said and I hoped dearly that I had not lead them away from the correct path. I had no idea what that could do to the plot, or their lives. I needn’t have worried. He shrugged it off, 

“Yeah, you’re right, they’re just legends. The falling star thing isn’t something I had considered before but it doesn’t really seem feasible.”

I nodded absently,

“ ‘Specially since its not the actual stars that are falling.”

He looked at me funny, 

“Huh? course it is, it’s in the name.”

I stared at him for a second. Surely alchemy hadn’t taken over these peoples minds to the point that they neglected astronomy? Some transmutations  _ required  _ alignment to certain stars and other such things. As a fan of Doctor Who I couldn’t imagine not having at least rudimentary knowledge of the stars. 

I swallowed, trying to get my bearings from that brief shock. 

“No, it’s actually pieces of rock called meteors that hit the planets’ atmosphere and burn up, leaving that trail of light. Anything that actually survives enough to impact is then called a meteorite. Sometimes they contain rare ores but mostly they’re just space rock. Star are giant burning balls of gas, just like the sun, only much much much further away.”

He put down the papers he had been looking at,

“Where did you hear that?”

Hear it? Not learn it? He didn’t freakin’  _ believe  _ me?!

“It was taught in school in my country. There were also various publications on the subject, and extensive government supported research. It was something of a hobby of mine to study while I was ill and couldn’t move around much, I sent my brother to the library to get books for me every other day.”

He sat on the table facing me, unconvinced.

“And where did those people get their information?” 

I rolled my eyes, 

“Look, there were telescopes involved and a few pictures taken. Believe me or not but either way it doesn’t help with this code thing.” 

It was his turn to nod absently as he shuffled through the papers on the table beside him. “I’ve heard of some complicated codes before, but never one as complex as yours. Do you think you could have a quick look at this?” 

He handed me a page and I took it, glancing at it and realizing it was page 57 of the third cookbook in the series. I had actually kept this recipe on the off chance that I would actually have the time to cook something.

“When did you see my code? I don’t remember showing it to you and I certainly didn’t leave it anywhere that you could have picked it up.”

He shrugged,

“Colonel Bastard mentioned it to me while I was in the hospital after you left. He said that it made no sense whatsoever to him, and that you looped it through two different languages.” 

I internally smirked,  _ Three actually, one that I created on my own, but ya know, who’s counting? _

I made a show of looking over the page, analyzing each word and the placement of it on the page, but got about as far as I did the first time I took a look at. Nowhere. I sighed, and handed it back to him, 

“Sorry Edward, but I have no clue what this could be other than an intriguing recipe for cookies.” 

It was munch later when the silence had become oppressive and Maes had yet to move to leave and I felt a crushing need to break the aura of brain-pain hovering over the brothers. 

“Ya know, I think I actually have that recipe at home. I probably read this cookbook before and never even realised that it was alchemy research.”

Edward nodded distractedly and I felt slightly guilty for breaking his concentration but realized it must not have been that great in the first place if he responded at all. Usually he was completely in his own world when researching. 

“I know, there was record of you checking it out before. I had wondered about that, you don’t exactly seem to be the cooking type.” 

I glared half-heartedly. 

“If I had more time I would cook more. I used to like it, but now its not really worth it and I think take-out might own my soul by now.”

He cackled a bit at that and then froze, muttering under his breath,

“Soul…” 

He ruffled through the pages and the more he found and put together the more that he swore. I tucked some of the words away for future reference as the breakdown from the anime happened full force. Armstrong was around somewhere, I wasn’t sure when he had arrived. I wasn’t sure what was really happening around me for the most part. I had to slip into my mind palace many times just to maintain my grip on reality. I needed sleep, and badly. I couldn’t remember the last time I slept properly. I mumbled something garbled about needing to lie down and everyone gave me a sympathetic look, thinking I was taking the ‘key to the stone’ hard. 

I struggled out of my military jacket, revealing my black under armor type shirt. I tugged my gun holster off my belt and set it to the side, found a dark corner of the room, and lay down on the floor, not bothering to try clearing a place on the couch or search for a pillow. I was out seconds after I registered that despite the off-putting color the carpet didn’t stink as badly as I had feared. 

  
  


I woke to Sergeant Ross shaking me violently, blubbering out about the Elrics escape and the Lab by the prison. I noticed someone had placed my jacket over me like a blanket and I pulled it on quickly, fingers barely fumbling the buttons, I was better rested than I had been for weeks. Ross was still talking, mentioning how the higher ups were going to kill them for letting the Elrics escape, and how Maes had left me because of how tired I looked. I did quick inventory, and after reclaiming my gun from where I’d abandoned it earlier I took a quick bathroom break that wouldn’t exist if this were actually an anime, rather than anime quality-ish. THAT was when I set out to find the Elrics. It would be best if I could keep Edward from getting hurt, and I would love to save Al from the pain of doubting his own existence. 

I gave quick orders to call Maes, and the brought up my mental map of central. I wasn’t as far away as I had assumed. I took off at a run, because who knew how much time I had lost because of sleeping through their escape. 

  
  
  


**~TimeLordOfPie**


	12. Chapter 12

I stared blankly at the wall in front of me, knowing that I had no giant armored brother to give me a leg up, nor automail to move any barbed wire with. I could hear the shouting from Al’s fight with Barry on the other side of the stone barrier, and decided that the time for stealth was gone. Ed could be fighting Envy and who knew what the butterfly effect a la Stephanie had done with the situation. Whipping out a piece of chalk I had only just taken to carrying around with me I sketched out a well practiced circle. >line-line-curve-line-careful-volatile< It formed near effortlessly and I worried for a second at how easily explosives came to me. This circle was just like Scars, an abrupt stop at the deconstruction phase of transmutation resulting in a violent reaction, only I funneled it through stone in this case, rather than human tissue. 

I slammed a hand on the stone, taking a second to stare in awe at the blue lightning-like light that leapt from my creation, not quite used to it yet. For someone who grew up reading Harry Potter, Artemis Fowl, and Eragon this was closer to magic than I had ever dreamed I would get. It sent a thrill of excitement through me, and put a slightly maniacal grin on my face. I ran through the smoke,drawing my weapon and ducking low from habit, surveying the situation in front of me. Both Al and Barry had stopped to see what the explosion was all about. I took aim at Barry, glancing over at Al, 

“Is everything all right here Alphonse? Where’s your brother?”

Barry looked on in confusion, most likely wondering who the hell I was as Alphonse  hesitated to answer and I wanted to swear violently. Barry had already sprouted his crap about Al not being real. After a second Al pointed toward the building,

“He went through the vent, I have everything covered here, go help brother.”

Wariness surged through me, not quite sure I should leave Al alone with the other armors poisonous words. Al decided for me, 

“Go! Barry says that the others are much worse than him.” 

I looked at the glowing red of his eyeholes and nodded, 

“Be careful Al, I better see you in one piece when this is all over with.” 

That said, I turned and started sketching the circle >lines-and-curves-and-more-oomph-the-stone-is-deeper-here< fire bloomed at the heart of the circle as my fingers grazed it, exploding inward, taking out a section of the wall. I had been careful, not wanting to take the entire building down, yet. From here I had no idea where Edward was, all the anime had shown was a journey through the vents which I had bypassed in favor of speed. I had paused at three diverging hallways, uncertain where to go when I heard footsteps. I ducked down a bit and inside a door, using the reflection of the glass in the door across the hall to see Envy and Lust walking past the opening to hallway number 3, speaking to one another in lowered voices. I couldn’t hear what they were saying, but I wasn’t particularly worried about it. There was dust everywhere, either just plain dirt or left behind from disuse of certain corridors. They left tracks through it, very distinctive tracks, a pair of heels right next to flats. I waited and followed them, slowly, being sure to look around corners carefully and make sure that I didn’t run into them. 

When I had finally made it to the large room where Edward was Lust had already making her move against helmet guys brother. It was watching those nails ruthlessly cleave apart a human  _ soul _ that made me realize that I could die here. They didn’t care who I was, they wouldn’t see me as a ‘sacrifice’ or whatever. I was a nuisance. I might end up as collateral in this fight that wouldn’t have killed Ed even if I Hadn’t interfered. 

I pushed the fear aside, trying to embrace the military mindset they had tried to sell in bootcamp. Good thing I did too, Lust was speaking, low sultry tones falling through the air in a way that radiated danger.

“Perhaps our dear sacrifice here is getting to be too much of a problem, perhaps we should just...solve...it.” 

She brought her fingers up in the prime position to spear Edward and I snapped into action, firing one shot, cleanly through the back of her head. She jerked and fell over, I pointed my weapon at Envy, who had turned to look at me, edging my way around quickly so that I was standing beside Edward. 

“Are you alright, Ed? What kind of alchemy was freaky nails over there using for that trick?” 

I played my cards carefully, aware of my role as clueless soldier, not supposed to know anything barring the stone’s inhumane ( _ oh god terrible pun I’m-so-sorry) _ ingredients, and the fact that the brothers were looking for it. Come to think of it, the brothers didn’t know much about it either at this point. Unless the ripples caused by my arrival went further than I had anticipated. Who knew what they had said to him in the window before I had arrived when they were alone with him. 

Edward stared at me blankly, 

“Stephanie? What are you doing here?”

I resisted the urge to roll my eyes, not wanting to leave Envy unwatched for even that long. A bullet probably wouldn’t kill him but it could sure as hell slow him down while he ‘rebooted’ or whatever. 

“Edward, Ross woke me up hysterical over you boys running somewhere the Lieutenant Colonel had deemed dangerous, as the lowest ranking officer and your friend I ran straight here. Literally, I can’t drive in this country, so be grateful, and give me a sit-rep.” 

“...I have no idea whats going on or who these people are.”

I resisted the urge to face-palm, but felt the anime-style sweatdrop fall anyway. I sighed, repositioning my weapon slightly and cocking my head to the side, not looking away from Envy for a second,  _ Why is he looking at me like that? Curiosity can’t be good coming from him, from what Taylor said about him he should be all ‘Puny Human you know not what you deal with’ by now…  _

“Please tell me you at  _ least _ found what you came here for?”

“Ummm, no. She killed him before he could tell me.”

“Him? All I saw her stab was a piece of metal.” 

He shook his head viciously, 

“I’ll explain later, but-”

Envy twitched and I shot over his shoulder in warning, regretting having to waste bullets but knowing its what I would do if he were a normal human. 

“Not recommended palm-tree boy. How about YOU explain what's going on here?”

I cranked up the intensity of my glare when he just stared dumbly at me for a few seconds. That had no visible effect until he began walking towards me. My gun was aimed at his forehead, but I wasn’t able to pull the trigger. Violet eyes stared  _ through _ me, and I worried at what he saw. I had never shot someone face to face like this when not purely in self defense. This was feeling cold blooded, and I couldn’t quite force myself to do it. My hands wanted to shake but I held them steady through sheer force of will as he stalked closer, still jolting slightly when he spoke, scratchy voice ringing through the silence. 

“What have we here? Little girl playing soldier? You have a strange feeling about you, something I’ve never felt before and I’ve been around a loooooong time.” 

I squinted at him for a second,

“Um are you trying to flirt or something? Because it’s reeeeaaallly not working. You may be doing it wrong.”

He scowled, “Of course not, girl. I’m merely wondering  _ what  _ you are.”

I raised an eyebrow, “Female.”

Which is more than I could say for Envy. No one really knew what ‘it’ was. I just kinda see him as male. I think. I try not to think about it too hard. 

There was a crackle of alchemy lightning behind me and I jerked, looking at Lust, who was reforming. I did my best not to drop my weapon in shock. Seeing it on screen, and knowing that it was possible in theory is light years away from seeing it in person. it was a gory sight that would have had me puking my guts out before the whole ‘military boot camp’ debacle. I backed up closer to Ed, 

“Okay, this is uncool on so many levels...and slightly cool on others. But I SHOT you! You should not be standing up!”

She smiled grimly at me, walking in a half circle around us, examining me up and down, but ignoring what I said.

“You were right Envy. There is something different about her. But it’s not of consequence. Leave her. Get the pipsqueak out, I’ll see about her, and the lab.” 

Just like that I was pushed out of their minds. Ignored. That pissed me off. 

But anger faded and was replaced by fear. They were going to kill me. Explode the building, after leaving me nothing but a corpse, an empty shell of everything I used to be, still inside it. I didn’t even need to be here in the first place, but I had come, and now I was going to die. My legs shook slightly and I could barely hear Ed ranting about being called a pipsqueak over the pounding of my own heart. I was frozen in place, but Lust was advancing towards me. I heard Edward fall behind me. Envy carried Edward off, probably to drop him right in front of the military, just like in the show. I was going to die.

Lust approached closer, smiling seductively.  _ I am going to die _ . She walked closer still, holding her fingers up, lengthening them slowly. I staggered back, barely finding my legs long enough to manage a few steps before I faltered again. My breathing was spotty, I was seeing two things at once. The words, all my wonderful words that I had been storing for my entire life were flashing before me, and around me, I looked desperately for something to save me.  _ I am going to die.  _ Lust must have seen my eyes darting around because her smile became a smirk. 

“There’s no escape for you girl. I almost pity you, dying so young, but you’re not even that pretty, so I suppose that it isn’t too tragic then.”

Her hand raised, pointing at me, and my life flashed before my eyes. Literally. My little talent let me look at every last one of my loves ones before I met my end. I was apologizing to Hughes image before me when one of her ultimate spears met my gut.

  
  
  
  



	13. Chapter 13

_I’m a failure. A complete and utter failure at life._

_The rain fell gently, but I found myself wishing for it to pound down hard, painfully so. Anything to distract from everything that was happening. Roy, standing stoically beside me, Elysia, her cries echoing around the graveyard, the stupidly itchy sling that bound my arm, and the scene before me. The coffin lowering into the ground. The last scene of this place that I had viewed through a screen from a different world. I took a deep breath, bowing my head, just praying that it would be over soon. My eyes closed and the last few days played back against my will._

 

_(Flashback)_

Lust left me there, bleeding out, to be on her way in order to blow up the lab. That’s what she assumed. She was mistaken, but how was she to know that 7 years ago in an alternate world I had studied up on the components of Kevlar bullet proof vests? And that I had made an alchemy project of synthesizing some? And then made it my personal mission to use this new magic/science art to make it thinner, lighter, and more durable?

However her ‘Ultimate Spears’ were indeed ultimate. She used only enough force to burrow halfway through me, in theory, so she did indeed get past my ‘armour’. Barely. I had a glorified scratch, but I played dead, and waited for her to leave the room. I either waited too long, dreading her sudden return, or she was faster than I had assumed. I wasn’t all the way out when the explosion through me into the street. I saw blue uniforms heading my way through the haze of pain and smoke. I dragged a breath in, setting off a coughing fit that made my vision swim. Some of the blue uniforms reached me, one of them tried to sit me up, but they didn’t even check where I was injured. Strong hands grasped at my right arm. My scream only stopped when I lost consciousness.

 

~~~

 

When I finally woke I was in the hospital. Once I realized where I was I struggled to sit up. The twinge in my right arm when I tried to use it to push myself up told me something was cracked, but not quite broken. I sucked in air, trying to keep the stop the world from spinning. I screwed my eyes closed, breathing deeply, saying the Gringotts poem under my breath, trying to get my head straight. I switched languages for variety, and eventually felt that I wouldn’t immediately throw up if I moved. I opened my eyes, only to be met with Hughes stare. Well, I have some explaining to do. I opened my mouth to explain what had happened but he held his hand up. He closed his eyes and sighed, pinching the bridge of his nose between thumb and forefinger.

“There’s no need to explain yourself, Edward and Alphonse already gave me the rundown before they left.”

I tried to look sheepish, but dropped it once what he said finally made it through my head.

“Left? They’ve left?! How long was I out?”

He looked at me, worried now,

“Only two days. Edward wasn’t nearly as bad off as you were, he said you got there right in time. He and Al have headed off to Resembool early today to get his automail fixed, then they're off to see their teacher.”

This morning. He left this morning. That means today was D-day. I had to get out of this hospital, I was behind schedule because I was an _idiot_ who just _had_ to follow the boys into danger when I _knew_ that they would be okay. True Edward was better off than he had been originally, but _still_...it wouldn’t be worth it if it cost Hughes his life.

I nodded, then turned and threw my feet over the side of the bed, gently but expertly unhooking the IV. Hughes reached out to stop me but I kept going.

“What are you doing?!”

I glanced up at him briefly, but kept going, swiftly and easily putting the equipment away or disposing of it as was needed. I plopped a bandage on the wound on my arm, it had kittens on it and I tried not to roll my eyes. This was a _military_ hospital, and they have kitten bandaids stored in the hospital rooms…

“I’m leaving. There’s investigating to be done, I’m not going to sit here all uselessly. I’m perfectly fine, anyway. No need to stay in the hospital. Besides, I don’t like hospitals. Something about the smell. Disinfectant mixed with despair, I think.”

I swayed slightly, and he gently pushed me back onto the bed.

“Relax, the investigation won’t up and disappear while you’re recovering.”

I took a deep breath to argue, but I could feel it in the air. I was going to lose.

 

Hughes left the hospital without me, and I waited approximately a half hour before I signed myself out. Hughes hadn’t ‘ordered’ me not to leave. So it was _technically_ alright. I may have bribed the woman at the front desk with juicy gossip I picked up a few weeks ago so that she wouldn’t tattle to Hughes on me.

I acted like I was going home to rest, rather than straight back to work, just in case she told him that I left anyway. I ignored the meds they prescribed, not wanting the fog on my thoughts, not today. I wore the sling until I was home, then took it off, despite the pain and decreased movement. There was no way that I could get ready in time using only one arm. One and a technical _half,_ maybe.

I closed my black-out curtains, bought for this very reason. I was going to be throwing around some _serious_ alchemy, I didn't’ need anyone to see the light and wonder what was going on. I gathered my materials, checked my notes, and began. By the time night fell I was finished. I wrapped my project up in a dark colored tarp, packed my other stuff, and gave my usual coat a longing look. I turned instead to a dark shaded one, of a similar but not identical style. My normal clothing being my uniform I had changed into dark pants, and a dark shirt. Not true black, more dark grey. Black wouldn’t fit into all shadows, but would rather stand out.

Under the cover of darkness, in that small margin of time between when the sun went down and the streetlights were turned on I made my escape with my tools. I had found the place that matched Hughes murders scene perfectly. I was just stashing my stuff, going to see if he was approaching yet when I heard the shot. I felt the blood draining from my face and my lungs froze for a split second and then I was running. Slipping as quietly and quickly as I could through the shadows to the phone booth. I saw Envy fleeing, wearing Ross’s face, Hughes laying on the floor of the phone booth.

( _flashback end)_

I was brought back to the present by a hand on my shoulder. I looked up into Roy’s face, still remembering his voice coming through the abandoned phone.

“Come on Sergeant. We have some paperwork to do.”

He led me away from the grave, and I finally noticed that everyone had left, probably a long time ago. I finally dragged my eyes from the headstone and back to him, looking odd with his hair slicked back like that.

“...paperwork?”

He nodded, opening the back passenger side door of the car for me.

“Yes, the paperwork. I have to get you transferred to my team somehow. Hughes would never forgive me if I left his favorite subordinate to just float around in a mess of bureaucracy.”

“...your team?” I asked, bewildered.

I could almost hear the eyeroll as Hawkeye shifted the car into drive.

“Yes, Arcaro. My team. Unless you don’t want to investigate what’s going on with our military? I would understand, you aren’t exactly a citizen, you don’t owe any loyalty to our people so-”

“No.”

“Oh?”

“I don’t owe the people any loyalty, honestly the only people I know are military, I’m not familiar with many citizens. But Hughes has my loyalty. Him, his wife, his daughter. I won’t fight for your citizens, don’t delude yourself. But I will fight for the Hughes family.”

I saw his head tilt, and I just _knew_ he was smirking.

“I wouldn't’ have it any other way.”

  


**~TimeLordOfPie**


	14. Chapter 14

They were still blaming Ross. I was the first on the scene, and I reported seeing alchemic light around the one who had killed Hughes, but I said that the shadows were tricky, and I didn’t know who it was. Ross was arrested. Things were moving quickly, too quickly, I could barely keep up. Mustang had questioned me about what had happened, I had given the truth, partly. I was taking a walk, enjoying my ill gotten freedom from the hospital, when I heard a shot, and rushed to the scene. Everyone tread lightly around me, like they expected me to break. But they didn’t know. They didn’t know what really happened, and I couldn’t tell them. I had realized a while ago, and tried my best to think of a way around it. If Hughes was dead in the show, then he would be dead here. He had died for a reason, he couldn’t pass on the information and Roy had to kill Lust in his rage. At least that’s what my brother had told me at one point, long ago. So for all intents and purposes, for a  _ plot device _ , my only friend was dead.

( _ Flashback) _

I collapsed on my knees beside Hughes, hands tentatively reaching for him. 

“Lt. Colonel?” 

My voice was timid, I was scared. Scared that I had failed, not only in my judgement earlier, but in my main mission. I was already a failure, but I had hoped that didn’t mean that I had completely lost in the end. I touched his shoulder gently, trying to push back tears, and the oddest thing happened, he wheezed in a breath and tried to sit up. I froze, and he started to speak. 

“Damn, Arcaro, I guess you were right, happy? Wearing your experimental body armor  _ is _ a good idea. I think it’s saved two lives in as many days.”

My eyes darted to his wound, his hand was covering it, but it slowly moved away. He unbuttoned his shirt, swiftly, revealing his undershirt, a hole punched through it, with the gleam of metal still lodged in the armor underneath. I sat back on my heels, breathing deeply, and laughed. I didn’t stop until Hughes touched my shoulder, concerned. At that I was reminded what I was doing. I looked him straight in the eye and spoke, more serious than I’m sure he had ever seen me. “Do you trust me?” 

It was a loaded question. I was content to give him time to-

“Of course!” I started,

“That was quick.”

He shrugged, eyeing me seriously.

“A team doesn’t work as closely together as ours does and not earn some trust points to go around. I’m guessing your big brain cranked out a plan just now about where to go from here?”

“Sort of. You need to run, and not be seen. Don’t talk to anyone. Don’t go home. They think you’re dead, and we need to keep it that way so they can’t make you  _ actually _ dead, especially when we don’t completely know what’s going on.”

I  searched in my pockets for a piece of paper and pen, set aside for this reason exactly, scribbling down the phone number. 

“Here’s how to contact me. I may not be in, but you can leave a message. This is a secure line, I should know, I built it myself. It’s piggybacking off the civilian grid, so no military hacking, but I added some...personal touches to the wiring, so it couldn’t be tracked.” I grabbed my wallet, yanking out all of the money there and pressing it into his hands. 

“Find somewhere to hide and call me and we can get you set up somewhere safer, and figure out what really to do, then make a more long-term plan from there. 

He looked desperately like he wanted to argue, he probably didn’t want to leave his family, the family man that he is. He opened his mouth to argue, but I shook my head, eyes wide and practically begging, 

“Please Maes, if you were ‘alive’ to the world, then there would be nothing stopping that thing from coming back again.” 

He closed his eyes and took a deep breath.

“The Fuhrer-” 

“I know.”

He looked at me startled. 

“How!?” 

“You know that I dabble in alchemy? Well, I dabble in the Xingese version too, which you Amestrians have next to  _ no _ literature on by the way. They feel alchemy in the air and earth, the very life force of existence, I’ve been training myself to feel it too.” I had indeed, but I’d had limited success so far. “That thing, and the ones in the lab, they share an aura of ‘wrong’ with the Fuhrer. No doubt there are more of them, stronger ones that can hide from me while I’m still figuring this shit out. So if you would kindly get your ass in gear and run for your life I would greatly appreciate it.” 

We stared at one another until finally he looked away and sighed.

“I’ll be in touch soon so we can figure it out. How are you going to convince them that I’m still dead without a body?”

“Alchemy that I will promptly bullshit together, and maybe pay off the ME. I have a few ideas.”

“Thank you, for this, for all of it.”

I rolled my eyes, muttering under my breath at his retreating back. 

“Don’t thank me yet.”

From there I moved quickly, crouching down on the pavement, etching in a gentle chalk circle, easy to wash away once I’m done. > _ circles-lines-my-own-creation-proud-of-this< _ and then I clapped my hands. I knew it wasn’t required to activate a circle, but there was finality to it, and it centered my mind. Lightning flew, and then darkness surrounded me. There were shadows now, but they were my shadows. I bent the light around this area so I wouldn’t be seen. I knew there was some homunculus who could control darkness and spy through the shadows, but I also knew how to keep it away. As I went about my now hidden business I thanked God for my brother, who doesn’t give a damn about spoilers, and gives character run downs, and gives away plot devices. True it would have been better if he had been more  _ thorough  _ but beggars can’t be choosers. 

_ (Flashback end) _

The paper with Ross’ face on it shook in my hands. My hair covered my eyes. Hiding me from sight. I was in civilian clothing, still technically off-duty. Black jeans, black under armor shirt that was standard for under military uniforms, and my boots. My jeans I had to transmute, but there was no way in hell I was wearing this 1910’s crap. It didn’t feel right, and it made me uncomfortable, constantly distracting me. I put the paper down carefully, contemplating life as a whole.

For me it was pretty straight forward. Keep this world from the terrible fate it was destined for. But Maria Ross was still a victim. I had no idea what happened to her in the original time line. But I knew that there was no way that I could  _ prove _ that it wasn’t her. My job had changed on me, my entire unit was disbanded with the death of our superior officer, I was snatched up by Roy and his people. I don’t know how, and I wasn’t about to ask. I knew they already had a guy with encyclopedic knowledge and near perfect recall, so I didn’t bother revealing what I could do. It wasn’t something I liked to bandy about in any case. Not even Hughes knew. I’m sure he had an idea that there was something up with my brain and my thought processes, but he didn’t  _ know. _

I was lost in thought, wondering for a bit that after all of this mess, (if I survived) what I was going to do with my life. I already knew there was no way home. I probably wouldn’t want to stay in the military forever, but then again maybe I did. I knew Roy wanted to be Fuhrer. Maybe I could help with that. I honestly had nowhere else to be, and I quite liked working investigations. It was all very NCIS-ish. I was trying to decide if I should get a cat in 4 years when the door burst open. It was Edward. Shit. 

I ducked my head down, waiting for the shouting match between him and Roy to finish. It was all very distressing. Al stood solemnly in the background. I sighed, and stood. 

“This is going to take a while. Does anyone want coffee?”

The soldiers shook their heads, only glancing away from the entertaining fight happening in front of them. I turned to Al,

“Alphonse?”

He started, I think everyone did. In that moment they probably remembered that they had never told me about Ed and Al’s past. There was silence, even Ed and Roy had paused in their fight. I glanced around, as if confused, and Al answered, 

“Ah, no, thank you.” 

I shrugged, making my way to the door, calmly stuffing my hands in my coat pockets.

“All right then, just for me then. I’ll be back in a few minutes.” 

I glanced at Al again, 

“Please make sure they don’t destroy the building before I get back.” 

I swept out, swiftly making my way to the cafeteria, leaving them to decide. With my little prod at their memory they would have to discuss whether to tell me or not. It didn’t matter to me either way. It might be better if they told me, so I could be kept in the loop about things. But if they didn’t tell me then I had plausible deniability if I was caught by the bad guys for whatever reason. I paid for my cola and sat down at an empty table in the mess hall, bringing out my research book, I settled down for a long wait. I would give them the time they needed to evaluate my character. 

  
  


**~TimeLordOfPie**


End file.
